Financial analysts at Morgan Stanley are suggesting that Apple’s iPad may already be having a negative impact on portable PC sales. According to a recent Morgan Stanley/Alphawise survey, 44 percent of U.S. consumers looking to buy an iPad have indicated that they would be foregoing the purchase of a netbook or notebook because of the decision.
Tablets in particular, may prove a headwind to notebook growth, wrote Morgan Stanley analysts Katy Huberty and Mathew Schneider in recent report. Given the versatility of the iPad in particular, they noted, cannibalization is a threat.
“The notebook (44 percent), iPod Touch (41 percent) and eReader (28 percent) markets are the most at risk,” Huberty and Schneider wrote. “Consumers see broad iPad use cases including browsing and email (90 percent), multimedia consumption (67 percent), print media consumption (60 percent), gaming (57 percent), and other apps.”
Too Soon To Say
Apple recently said it has already sold more than one million iPads, including those coming from pre-orders. “Assuming that rate continues in May — and because even Apple Stores keep running out of stock, that seems likely — we’ll see Apple having sold about 1.5 million units by the end of May,” wrote Yankee Group Analyst Carl Howe in a blog.
Still, it is too early to reach any conclusions concerning the iPad’s potential impact on portable PC sales, according to Stephen Baker, vice president of market research firm the NPD Group.
“One month of sales is not a trend on anything — especially for Apple,” Baker said. “One of the things which Apple is great about is building momentum — and [that] tends to manifest itself very aggressively at the launch of a new product. But whether this is evidence of a long term trend remains to be seen.”
According to a recent NPD Group survey, consumer…