Winners and losers of post-PC era
Microsoft’s Windows 8 is scheduled to be released during the third week of October 2012. Even the release of a new operating system won’t be able to stop the slide of worldwide PC sales. The worldwide sales of personal computers are projected to drop to 357 million units, a drop of two percent for the year. In the meantime smartphone sales are expected to grow by 42 percent and tablets by 65 percent for the year. PC use is in decline as we know it and it is bound to take many companies down with it.
Among those that will face difficulties will be Microsoft, chip makers Intel and Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), and PC maker Dell. Microsoft is faced with declining sales. During its first fiscal quarter, sales fell nine percent. Even its newest weapon, the Surface tablet from Microsoft, won’t be able to stop its decline. Today, a tablet or smartphone can do many of the functions a PC did in the past. Other losers in the post-PC era include Cisco, Nvidia, Teradata, and Fusion-IO.
Google and Amazon.com are expected to flood the market with cheap, $199, tablets creating another big issue for Microsoft. It will also lower Google’s bottom line.