It has been reported that Dell along with the biggest search engine of China, Baidu, has planned to start a joint development of mobile phones and tablet computers, in order to target the market in China which is currently dominated by the likes of Lenovo and Apple Inc. China is considered to be one of the fastest growing markets for tablets and smartphones in the world and accommodates more than 900 million subscribers of mobile phones.
However, analysts remain skeptical on whether this partnership has what it takes to remove Apple from its position at the top of the market. According to a prominent analyst, Michael Clendenin, the imperative behind the deal is for Dell, who has had its own problems in the mobile and tablet market, to try and garner as much publicity as it can in order to attract more customers to its products. He added that he still believes that Apple will be ruling the markets in China at the end of the day.
Dell did not give out any timeline for the launch of the said devices; however, it was reported by the local media on Tuesday that the releases can come as soon as this November. Last week, a new mobile application platform was launched by Baidu, as the company offered a glimpse into the upcoming mobile OS, which is expected to cater to a large number of people who access the internet from tablet computers and smartphones.
The company stated that it had already struck partnerships with Dell and several other device manufacturers and it declined to comment on the new devices. According to Dell, its partnership with Baidu concerned the new mobile platform of the company.
Its prominence as the primary search engine in China has been built on very well by Baidu since the departure of Google last year as the company cited censorship concerns and hacking as big problems with staying in the country. The shares of the Chinese search engine have gone up by almost 50% this year, which made its market value escalate to $50 billion.
A tie-up between Dell and Baidu will be the latest development in a number of events which have shaped the market for mobile devices this year. Google’s acquisition of Motorola Mobility last month was one such event as the takeover effectively put Google into the lower end manufacturing business.
