Apple continues to sell lots of its iPad tablets but the company is now reportedly cutting the number of orders made to companies that make the parts for the device. Bloomberg reports that according to a new note from JPMorgan Chase, Apple has cut the fourth quarter numbers to several of the iPad"s supply chain vendors by as much as 25 percent. The note did not give a reason for such a drastic reduction in the parts orders.
The report claims that such a cut could affect the unit sales of vendors such as Hon Hai Precision Industry. However, JPMorgan U.S. analyst Mark Moskowitz believes that even with this cut, he expects Apple to stick to its previous iPad units sales projections. The report currently has Apple shipping between 10.9 million to 12 million units of the iPad in the third and fourth quarters of 2011. Apple has yet to comment on this new report.
Apple sold 9.25 million units of the iPad worldwide in the second quarter of 2011 and has recently managed to catch up with demand for the tablet, eliminating long delays between sales and shipments. It"s possible that Apple might be cutting down its vendor supply unit numbers in an effort to balance its supply and demand issues for the tablet. In any case, it"s almost certain that the iPad will continue to sell well and also continue to outpace sales of rival tablet products such as the Motorola Xoom, the Samsung Galaxy Tab, the Blackberry Playbook and others.