Global tablet market declined 4% in Q2, 2015, compared to the previous quarter with shipments totaling 44.7 million units, as per a latest from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Tablet Tracker.
There was a decline of 7% year over year in the Q2, 2015 that was attributed to little hardware innovation and limited vendor portfolio updates. Apple topped the tablet market by shipping 10.9 million units in the second quarter with 24.5% market share followed by Samsung at number 2 position with 7.6 million units shipped and 17.0% market share. Lenovo came in third with 2.5 million units and 5.7% share of the market. LG and Huawei ended the quarter in a statistical tie* for fourth place, rounding out the top 5 with each shipping 1.6 million devices. As previously mentioned, share outside the top 5 continued to outgrow the market, representing 46% of total tablet shipments in 2Q15.
“Beyond the decline, we’re seeing a profound shift in the vendor landscape as the top two vendors, Apple and Samsung, lose share in the overall market. In the first quarter of the year, Apple and Samsung accounted for 45% of the market and this quarter, with the growth of vendors like LG, Huawei, and E FUN, their combined share dropped to 41%. Each of the growing vendors managed to address available pockets of growth in the market; connected tablets for LG and Huawei, larger tablets and 2-in-1s in the right price bands for E FUN. This trend is also something we see on a wider scale with the top 5 vendors accounting for 54% of the market, down from 58% last quarter. It is worth mentioning that Huawei enters the top 5 ranking for the first time, while E FUN has re-entered the top 10 after more than a year, further indicating that the vendor landscape is indeed evolving.”
said Jean Philippe Bouchard, IDC Research Director for Tablets.
The collective Others category also declined with 2 million fewer tablets shipped. IDC’s data highlights how 2-in-1 devices represent a small portion of the tablet market, but one with growth.