A year after ultrabooks were launched, most PC makers have found it to be a dampener. High pricing and competing devices have ensured that demand was muted.

When it was launched, it came with the promise of having high performance chipset, being thin, light and longer battery life aimed at creating a new market segment.

While promises related to the features were offered to consumers, the pricing continues to be a big hurdle. Most of the ultrabooks were launched above Rs 50,000 and though it was expected to come down, volumes haven’t picked enough to bring down the price.

“The thin, instant on or long battery life adds cost to it and second is touch that also adds cost. The volume never happened so much for ultrabooks, so it has taken much longer than expected,” Rajiv Srivastava, Vice-President and General Manager – Printing and Personal Systems Group, Hewlett-Packard India told Business Line .

First mover

Although HP got the first mover advantage by being one of the first to launch the devices, “the market never shifted to as much as it should have,” Srivastava said.

Other than pricing, demand for ultrabooks has also been hit by the availability of other computing devices such as tablet. Analysts said sales of ultrabooks will pick up on its own pace, but not in the immediate future.

“It will take its own sweet time, but will grow, as there are people who cannot do without a PC or a notebook. There are official works such as Powerpoint presentations, which one cannot do quickly on a tablet,” Manasi Yadav, Senior Market Analyst-Mobiles and tablets, IDC India, said.

Intel came up with the concept of ultrabook primarily to allow traditional PC makers such as HP and Dell to compete with the increasingly popular tablets and computing devices from the likes of Apple and Samsung.

In order to qualify as an ultrabook, the laptops must have a next generation chipset from Intel, be less than 0.71 inches thick and a mechanism whereby the laptop can return from a sleep or hibernate state to a fully functioning system in roughly five seconds or less.

Intel’s game plan was to push up its chipset sales, which has declined due to intense competition from the likes of Qualcomm and Samsung. According to Gartner, Intel recorded a 3.1 per cent revenue decline, due to overall fall in PC shipments in 2012. Intel's market share was also down to 16.4 per cent in 2012 from 16.5 per cent in 2011.

But Sandeep Aurora, Director - Marketing and Market Development, Intel South Asia, said the ultrabooks as a category was moving in the right direction. “It is doing well and new categories are also coming in this category, which are energy efficient,” he said.

Prices may come down

PC makers along with Intel are working towards bringing down the pricing in a bid to make the device more popular. “Prices will continue to drop but not sure when. It may happen sooner or later. The rupee depreciated by 20 per cent last year, and that is one of the reasons,” Mahesh Bhalla, Executive Director and General Manager – Consumer and SMB, Dell India, said.

He said Dell already has products around Rs 40,000 and the gap between ultrabooks and notebooks is narrowing down. “Over time, this gap will drop and sales will grow,” Bhalla said.

>ronendrasingh.s@thehindu.co.in

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