Apple announced its fourth quarter 2012 financial results today, revealing that the company sold 22.9 million iPads during the final three months of the year. However, the company also saw a decrease of its Mac PC sales, as sales went down to 4.1 million units for the quarter.
Those kind of results don"t make Apple CEO Tim Cook worried. Indeed, in a conference call with analysts today following the release of the fourth quarter financial results, Cook indicated that Apple saw the larger Windows PC market as an even bigger target for the iPad
In the recording of Apple"s conference call, Cook stated:
On iPad in particular, we have the mother of all opportunities here, because the Windows market is much, much larger than the Mac market is, and I think it is clear that it’s already cannibalizing some, and I think there’s a tremendous amount of opportunity there. I’ve said for three years now that I believe the tablet market would be larger than the PC market at some point, and I still believe that. You can see by the growth in tablets and the pressure on PCs that those lines are beginning to converge.
While the tablet market may indeed be able to chip away at the PC market, the question is whether or not Apple will continue to be the dominant player in that industry. Cheaper Android tablets from Amazon and Google are certainly taking some of Apple"s market share, and Microsoft"s Surface tablet could become more popular, especially with the planned launch of the Surface Pro in February.
Source: Apple