i’ve long stated that there’s a worldwide market for 50,000 of anything when it comes to consumer electronics. In the case of MIDs though, it appears that there’s not even a market for that many.
DigiTimes is reporting sales of just 30,000 units compared to the 150,000 – 200,000 units Intel promised estimated. Intel claims that the weak sales were due to the global economic downturn but we have another opinion: mainstream consumers don’t want a device that is too big for the pocket, provides less functionality than a netbook, and is priced like a laptop.
Of course, a lot depends on how you define a MID. While, I’ll have more to say on that topic next week. In the meantime, how do you define the term MID, Intel marketing aside for the moment.
Isn’t Intel confusing Mobile Internet Devices with Ultra-Mobile PCs (aka Origami)?
I think your original assumption is correct. There IS a worldwide market for just about anything – call it a MID or a Shamwow… As population increases, niche markets increase as well. In this case, I tend to think of MIDs as anything smaller than a netbook with more functionality than my cellphone (which, in my book, rules out MID as a distinct category of “new” products). So is there a 50k+ market? Absolutely.