Apple will begin selling the iPad in 9 more countries on Friday. Austria, Belgium, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, New Zealand and Singapore will be added to the existing base, as Apple has been able to ramp its production to support new geographies.
However, “support” is somewhat relative as market researchers and analysts believe that Apple can still not meet actual demand and that iPad sales are limited by production capacity and not demand. iSuppli today raised its unit forecast by 81% to 12.9 million units for 2010. Next year, Apple may sell 36.5 million iPads and in 2012 50.6 million. If iSuppli is correct than Apple may sell 100 million iPads in less than three years, which makes it an interesting app platform, perhaps even more interesting than the iPhone for some.
“The iPad is shaping up to be the ‘Tickle Me Elmo’ of the 2010 holiday season, with product demand expected to vastly exceed available supply,” said Rhoda Alexander, director of monitor research for iSuppli.
For 2010, Apple is estimated to hold an 84% market share in tablet PCs and continue to dominate the segment at least until 2012. Competition may be insignificant until 2011 when other players, including HP, will have some products to show. iSuppli believes that Apple cannot sit back and just enjoy the success, but actually think about product improvements for next year. Likely additional changes will embrace an internal camera and expansion of the product line, potentially including additional screen sizes, the company said.
Apple rivals, on the other side, will have to focus less on the hardware but relate more to the suite of applications that can be paired with the hardware.
I may be speculating here, but I feel that this was not the last adjusted iPad forecast for the year.
more:here
