Chromebooks might not be widely popular as yet but it appears that they are starting to claim an increasingly large portion of the market. According to Gartner, Chromebook sales to end users are on pace to reach 7.3-million units in 2015. This is a 27% increase from 2014.
At the center of these estimates is education. In 2014, the education space represented 72% of the global Chromebook market.
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“Since the first model launched in mid-2011, Google’s Chromebook has seen success mainly in the education segment across all regions,” said Isabelle Durand, principal analyst at Gartner.
In the business market, Chromebook sales remain low despite interest from small and midsize businesses (SMBs) and vertical industries. This, according to Gartner, has caused Google to change its strategy. The company has targeted the business market with its work suite of office applications and has continued to improve access and functions by making more applications and services available offline.
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Gartner says that Chromebooks popularity will continue to grow in the business market.
“Chromebooks will become a valid device choice for employees as enterprises seek to provide simple, secure, low-cost and easy-to-manage access to new web applications and legacy systems, unless a specific application forces a Windows decision,” says Durand.
Despite this positive news, Gartner warns that Chromebooks must improve brand awareness, especially outside the US, in markets where consumers may not be familiar with the devices.
Chromebook rely on its cloud-based applications, and it is this that Gartner highlights as a major factor that could inhibit Chromebook’s penetration of the emerging markets due to connectivity issues. The biggest demand at the moment for Chromebooks comes from Australia, New Zealand and Japan. In North America alone, 84% of Chromebooks were sold in North America in 2014. EMEA, which represented 11 per cent of total sales of Chromebooks in 2014, is the secondary focus for vendors with Western Europe as the primary target. In Asia/Pacific the Chromebook market represented less than 3 per cent in 2014, with demand coming from Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
Leading in the Chromebook space in 2014 is Acer, selling more than two million units. This follows Samsung’s decision to exit the European Chromebook market and focus on tablets. In the second positions with 1.7 million units sold in 2014 was Samsung. At number three, a late entrant to the market, was HP, with 1 million units, its impressive run aided by its strong connection with education partners.
