Apple iPad: Probable Culprit For Netbooks' Declining Sales

These figures may not be conclusive. However, there is a chance the terribly hackneyed Apple iPad has inflicted a sizable degree of collateral damage on the outlook of budget computing solutions. If there's any correlation to be had, it would seem that competing tablets of the same genre as the iPad aren't the only ones left quaking in its wake. Either way, you can take it as a natural state of decline for netbooks, or, believe that the Cupertino company has created a vortex so powerful it is swallowing everything in its path, including netbook sales.

WIRED - The iPad isn’t considered a netbook, but Apple’s month-old tablet is already pounding on the budget computing category, according to market numbers.Research conducted by Morgan Stanley analyst Katy Huberty shows that netbook sales have slowed down dramatically since January — when the iPad was announced, and shrunk even more in April when the iPad shipped. Fortune’s Philip Elmer-DeWitt concludes that Apple’s tablet is gobbling up netbook sales.

If anything, maybe Mr Jobs has finally proven that a web-browsing tablet can be way sexier than a netbook, if not more marketable. Time will tell. Click here for more.