A new study by industry analyst NPD claims that Apple will sell 33 million full-sized iPads and 55 million iPad minis in 2013. The company reportedly knew that the smaller, lighter iPad mini would be popular when it made the smaller tablet the focus of its holiday lineup last year, but its staying power has even surprised Apple.
Despite its lower resolution, slower processor and graphics speed, the iPad's mini's advantages outweighed its cons for many buyers, who preferred an affordable tablet they could hold in one hand. NPD took a look at the orders from Apple suppliers, Electronista reports, and released a study that said Apple may have actually changed its orders to accommodate the demand. This contradicts another report released two months ago, which said that Apple was planning to build more iPads than minis.
DisplaySearch, NPD's subsidiary, says that although Apple ordered 7.4 million units of the 9.7-inch full-size iPad displays before the holiday period, that number dropped to 1.3 million. The 7 to 7.9-inch screens, which fit the iPad mini, went from 12 million to 14 million units ordered. The displays for 10.1-inch screens, which several Android tablets sport, only went up slightly.
Apple sold nearly 23 million iPads in the last quarter of 2012 (60 million for the year), making no distinction between sizes, and DisplaySearch says that total iPad sales in 2013 could exceed 88 million units. The analytics firm also believes that tablet sales will surge, possibly reaching 254 million units sold in 2013 from 160 million the year before. It expects phablet sales to make up about 60 percent of that.
Tim Cook, Apple's CEO, has warned analysts that given Apple's long and complex supply chain, using data from a single supplier could be risky, even if that point were true. DisplaySearch's claim, Electronista says, is similar to one from Taiwanese analytics firm DigiTimes on LG, who supplies display panels. This indicates that NPD may have used a single data point for its study.
