Initial demand for Acer and Asus Ultrabooks in Taiwan has been tepid. This may not bode well for their U.S. debut.
Ultrabooks are only just going on sale here in the United States, but it looks like sales in Taiwan are already disappointing Asus and Acer. DigiTimes reports that the two companies now expect to ship 100,000 Ultrabooks by the end of 2011, far short of their target of 200,000-300,00 units. A big problem is that they’re unable to price the notebooks lower than Apple’s MacBook Air. The Asus 11.6-inch Ultrabook costs about $1,205 (converted U.S. currency) compared to the $1,000 price of the Air. Acer’s 13.6-inch Aspire S3 is also priced at $1,101.
It’s difficult to say how well the new Ultrabook category will do in the U.S. (Our own Geoff Duncan speculates about it here), but it’s quite clear that this is where laptop computers are headed. Whether they call them Ultrabooks or not, laptops will continue to share more traits with smartphones and tablets, blurring the line between mobile and PC devices. It’s assumed that the introduction of Windows 8 will bring touchscreens to almost every PC as well.
Are you planning on buying an Ultrabook?
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