Chromebook sees 275% growth after entering 2021
The Chromebook shipment growth is attributed to Chrome's hold over the education space. According to preliminary data from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Personal Computing Device Tracker, Chromebook shipments grew 68.6% year over year with volumes reaching 12.3 million units. While this wasn't a record quarter for Chromebooks, it wasn’t far off the prior two quarters, which shattered previous highs. The tablet segment was a bit more tempered than Chromebooks but still managed to grow 4.2% year over year with shipments totaling 40.5 million units.
Despite the positive results during the quarter, both categories are experiencing some slowdown from the boom in the preceding quarters. For Chromebooks, while still in high demand and even on backlog for many education deals, vendors have started prioritizing higher margin Windows lapto oing component shortages. For tablets some of this applies, but there is also a bigger concern that consumer demand around tablets will slow much faster than Chromebooks or even the broader PC market.
Chromebooks are dual-nature devices that can be used both as a laptop and as a compact tablet. Chromebooks run on Google's Chrome OS, which is extremely light on hardware and hence does not require heft specifications to run.
"Opportunities in the education market are still ample for both tablets and Chromebooks. Online learning has gained rapid traction and has pushed forward the digital revolution in the learning space," said Anuroopa Nataraj, senior research analyst with IDC's Mobility and Consumer Device Trackers. "While there isn't a single solution globally, many emerging markets continue to ramp up use of Android tablets while schools in some developed markets like the USA and Canada lean more toward Chromebooks. That said, there has also been a recent uprising of Chromebooks in areas of Europe, as well as a few Asian countries as schools start opening up to platform change."
HP remains the top performer in supplying the Chromebooks, the worldwide Chromebook market has posted a 75 percent year-on-year (YoY) growth in the second quarter of 2021 (Q2 2021), as per a global notebook market data report by Canalys. The market research firm said that despite a slowdown in shipments growth, Chromebooks continued to outperform the rest of the PC product categories. When it comes to tablets, the report said the growth in shipments has started to stabilise as tablets posted a paltry 4 percent increase in shipments in Q2 2021.
Though launched 10 years ago, Chromebooks gained popularity after the pandemic
The salient features of a Chromebook
Sanjeev Mehtani, Country Manager Sales, Acer India
"Since the launch of Chromebooks 10 years ago, Acer has been a leader in expanding form factors in innovative ways that encourage our users to create, learn, and do more. In the last couple of years, Chromebook laptops are making their own space in the market. All thanks to COVID 19 pandemic, we witnessed a change in how people work and study. Chromebooks have appeared as the perfect device due to the light and easy to operate OS and cloud based approach making it easy for students and schools to manage content and accessibility.
On Chromebooks becoming popular choices
Chromebooks were mainly developed for simplicity which can perform well on a budget. With the ARC Welder – users are able to access the entire range of Apps which are available in the Android platform .This makes Chrome book compatible with the smartphones- helping users create a complete ecosystem between many devices at home including the Google assistant.. I think Chromebooks are worth buying post-pandemic, depending on the user’s needs. For those who want an affordable means to access the internet, the Chromebook is an outstanding option
Steering the demand from consumers
For both consumers and commercial customers Chromebooks are a great option. In the consumer space we have seen uptake in Chromebooks as their second laptop especially for accessing the internet and other daily computing needs. Enterprises are looking at Chromebooks as Chrome OS offers easy deployment, fairly secure as compared to others (sandboxing each Application) , built in Virus protection and verified secure boot. These features make many corporates who are serious about a diversified workforce consider Chromebooks as a strong alternative. We see this trend strongly emerging in the financial service segment where data security is of paramount importance."
Chromebooks fit in all needs, in terms of security, manageability, and scale
Arvind Melarcode Anand, Head - Value Category, HP India Market
The salient features of a Chromebook
"The traditional use case of Chromebook largely focussed on testing/ learning for education institutions (prominent in North America) is gaining rapid traction in India. Chromebooks have proved to be a great go to device for 1:1 personalized learning in markets outside India. We see education institutions in India fast adopting chrome as the go to tool for imparting education. A variety of tools help the teachers adapt instructions as per the learning needs and interests of each individual child in the classrooms.
A Chromebook not only runs web apps but is equipped to run Android apps too from the Google Play store. Because ChromeOS is essentially a web browser at its core, it delivers a aunique experience from the Windows and macOS notebooks. Instead of running Windows 10 or macOS, Google engineered its own operating system, Chrome OS, based on the Linux Kernel. Chrome OS is based on Linux and uses Google’s signature Chrome browser and its catalogue of office apps as its starting point. With adoption rates growing, Google has made regular updates and improvements to make the OS an industry leader
For HP, the demand for Chromebook devices has been extremely strong and that has led us to diversify our Chromebook portfolio to cater to new user segments.
On Chromebooks becoming popular choices
The current situation has established PCs as essential devices. With internet becoming ubiquitous, Chrome is becoming more popular with players across the PC market experimenting with premium ChromeOS-powered notebooks with more powerful internals, better build, and screen quality.Users are increasingly becoming comfortable with storage of data on cloud. For those few users who still want storage within their device, there are Chromebook offerings with enhanced storage options too. Processing power is another area where we have turned the traditional thinking of Chromebook to a low processing power device on its head. We now have offerings with mainstream processors and specifications where the user gets a meaningful alternative with a non-windows platform. The advent of smartphones has made users more comfortable with a variety of operating systems. HP recognized this growing need amongst users and accordingly launched a variety of offerings in chrome across screen sizes, price points and specifications to meet the needs of the market.
In fact, the growing popularity of Chrome OS in various global markets, has also helped the HP Chromebook become one of the most popular Linux-based computers of all time.
Steering the demand from consumers
Chromebooks have grown beyond education now. The key requirements of an enterprise are security, manageability, and scale, and that’s where Enterprise Chromebooks fit in well. Enterprises have started adopting Chrome essentially because of the inherently secure, read-only OS. This combined with the Chrome Enterprise Upgrade adds to the security ecosystem and using the manageability features over the cloud, the deployment becomes extremely quick and safe. OS updates, patch updates and the common manageability tasks are extremely simple forexecution which enhances the focus on supporting business development rather than spending time on mundane tasks."
Conclusion
Chromebooks are well and truly a mainstream computing product now. While the education sector still accounts for the majority of shipments, their popularity with consumers and traditional commercial customers has reached new heights over the course of the last year. HP and Lenovo dominate the Chromebook market, but the boom has been a case of a rising tide lifting all boats, allowing vendors such as Acer and Samsung to carve out substantial shares within the PC market by catering specifically to Chromebook demand. Google is now in a strong position to work with its OEM partners and the channel to cement a rosy future for Chromebooks. A substantial messaging and evangelization push coupled with the targeting of growth trends, such as flexible work arrangements and budget-conscious SMBs, will be vital to ensure the longevity of Chromebooks’ success.
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