ARM Community: Computex 2012: Growth of Tablets in China - ARM Community

Tablets are a hot topic in China right now! Many small and medium IT Chinese companies including chip makers and hardware manufacturers have entered the development and production of tablets, seizing their increasing presence in the global market. At COMPUTEX TAIPEI 2012, we saw many Chinese players proactively participating in the event. Some of these white-box makers are new entrants while others have survived the battle of MP3 and netbooks in the past. Now, these players all have their eye on the growing demand of tablets.

The tablet market will continue to address aggressive consumer price points suitable for the next billion. So it seems ARM licensees such as Nufront, Amlogic, and Rockchip are in a good shape with great market potential. At COMPUTEX, Nufront launched its 3^rd generation chip called NS115, which is based on Cortex^TM-A9 and Mali^TM-400, and is already being designed in customers’ tablets. Nufront also states that NS115 could be adopted by first-tier players in the future.



ARM expects that there will be 50 to 60 million Android tablets shipped in 2012, with a large number coming from the emerging market including China. With ARM-based CPUs and affordable Android 4.0 turn-key, manufacturers are able to produce tablets priced from $49 to $199, much lower than mainstream Android tablets, but with similar user interface and services.

At COMPUTEX, we saw almost all white-box products using Cortex-A9 chips plus the Mali MP Core to make 7-inch, 8-inch, and 9.7-inch models. All feature functions such as web browsing, gaming, and video streaming. Pipo is one example of this.



As mobile computing is scaled into other applications, ultra small form factors are becoming a key interest for consumers. At Geniatech’s booth, we saw a tiny ARM processor-based TV stick which can be plugged into a TV to turn the TV into a smart TV.



Although many Chinese white-box players failed in the netbook battle, right now they are rising and growing in the tablet market. There are some discussions on whether Chinese white-box companies can gain a large portion of market share in tablets. But it’s clear that computing technology that is driving the revolution, and bringing the whole world into a post-PC, mobile era.

Yen-shyang Hwang, freelancer. Yen had more than 4 years of expertise in IT news reporting, covering Apple, HP, Google and tons of IT topics for DIGITIMES Taiwan. By combining information from global brand names and their supply chain in Taiwan, Yen was able to provide readers with first-hand insights on global IT market trends. Yen has been covering ARM's development since 2009. At the moment, Yen is an MBA candidate at Georgetown University, USA.