Google may start shipping a Chromebook competitor presumably titled ‘Androidbook’ in the late third or early fourth quarter. This will be an attempt by the company to gain more control of the notebook market which it had entered with its Chromebook.
According to DigiTimes, Chromebook sales will surpass the one million mark this year, though they have sold only 500,000 units so far. In spite of that, Google will be releasing an Android powered notebook, ironically pitted against its own product. The Androidbook is expected to be a fully-functional, mobile OS-based laptop powered by Android (probably Key Lime Pie, Android’s next iteration) and is likely to feature a touch screen. It is speculated to be similar to the Asus Transformer Pad Infinity, but no definite specifications have been disclosed yet.
The Androidbook is not expected to be positioned as a replacement for Chromebook and both the products will probably be endorsed by the company simultaneously. However, the arrival of such a device would only strengthen the possibility of a merger between Chrome and Android in the future. Android creator Andy Rubin’s resignation as the head of the Android project and Chrome head Sundar Pichai’s ushering into the top Android job suggest that both the platforms are to follow the same path gradually.
Most netbooks in the market had a price tag of $300 to $400 when they released a decade ago but Chromebooks can be purchased now for as low as $199. Till the arrival of Chromebook Pixel, Google positioned Chromebooks as cheap, secondary laptops with a no frills online-only interface. However, Chromebooks aren’t getting cheaper and the tablet market presents a much more affordable entry point for customers today. Amazon’s standard-definition Kindle Fire is now sold for just $159 and HP is expected to price its first Android tablet at around $170.
Google may have anticipated difficult times ahead in convincing customers to buy Chromebooks due to tough competition and hence decided to introduce Androidbooks, which will be lower priced, run over 700,000 Android apps and also boast of a touch screen interface. Androidbooks may be successful just to due to the sheer familiarity of Android and the lure of the largest app market among all mobile platforms today.
April 7, 2013 at 12:57 pm
There is a lack of solid figures when it comes to Chromebook sales. However one thing is certain – the 500,000 number refers to number of $199 Acer C7 Chromebooks sold in the last 100 days – not the total number of Chromebooks sold so far. Samsung’s $250 Series 3 Chromebook is the best selling laptop of all time at Amazon and has topped Amazon’s best selling list every day since it went on sale 150 days ago. It has undoubtedly sold far more than the Acet C7 in the last 150 days, possibly twice or three times the number. Acer has said that Chromebooks account for 10% of its computer sales. UK’s largest high street retail outlet Curry’s PC World also announced recently that Chromebooks account for 10% of its computer sales.
Web statistics indicate that the installed base of Chromebooks is currently at 0.07% of all computing devices – which means the total sold so far cannot be less than 4 million. The same web statistics show that the installed base of Chromebooks has grown by 700% over the previous year. Putting all the known data together, the likely numbers are 500,000 Chromebooks sold between summer 2011 when Chromebooks first went on sale to 2012 (most sales were to schools), and 3.5 million were sold from summer 2012 to now – the majority of those in the last 150 days. The current rate of sale is very high despite having been available in only two countries – US and UK, with a very limited number of outlets where customers could try them out, and little or no advertising budget. The total numbers don’t look very impressive until you take these facts into account. Chromebook sales certainly put the 1.5 million Windows 8 devices sold so far in the shade – only 1.5 million despite the huge hype and advertising budget spent on Windows 8 devices, and the wide range of retail outlets and countries where Windows 8 devices have gone on sale. It is no wonder Acer stated publically that Chromebooks are selling whereas Windows 8 devices are not.
Google hasn’t really been pushing Android for notebooks – only touch devices, and they have been promoting Chromebooks for loatop form factors only. With all this in mind, I am just wondering whether this Android notebook thing is a case of Google giving into pressure from OEMs who cannot sell their Windows 8 hybrid and touch devices and wish to repurpose them by installing Android, which the OEMs know will sell. There is a precedent for this in the Acer C7 Chromebook, which is a repurposed Windows laptop which wasn’t selling with Windows. In this case Google relaxed its normal requirement for an SSD and minimum battery life of 6.5 hrs in order to allow Acer to turn its Windows version which wasn’t selling, into its best seller, simply by installing ChromeOS. It would certainly make sense for OEMs who can’t sell Windows 8 devices to sell Android models with a huge number of touch applications – unlike Windows 8 or Windows RT which are sadly lacking in touch applications, and are distinctly sub-par compared to proper laptops when running Windows applications. That would certainly make sense.