An article published by the Taiwanese Government Information Office on Monday cites Quanta vice chairman and president C.C. Leung as saying his company expects to see considerable growth in the global netbook market during the 2009 calendar year thanks to a flurry of new contract orders.
U.S.-based HP and Sony of Japan are said to have signed new netbook manufacturing agreements with the original systems manufacture this quarter. The report adds that in addition to "orders from existing brand clients as Acer, Lenovo, Hewlett Packard and BenQ, Quanta is expected to add Sony [U.S.] and Apple as clients for the contract manufacture of netbook computers in 2009."
Quanta shipped a total of 9.7 million netbooks during the third quarter of 2008 to its various customers but is expecting sales of the budget notebooks to remain relatively flat for the fourth quarter, which ends shortly.
When asked recently about the prospect of an Apple netbook, chief executive Steve Jobs was quick to downplay the offerings as a "nascent category" in the portable computing market, saying the devices are off to a slow start. However, he noted that his company would be prepared to enter the market should it pick up.
"As best as we can tell, there's not a lot of them being sold," he told analysts during an October conference call. "But we'll wait and see how that nascent category evolves, and we have got some pretty interesting ideas if it does evolve."
98 Comments
Nothing like following the pack. We should have had these already.
That's funny - isn't Apple TV a "nascent" product itself?
That's funny - isn't Apple TV a "nascent" product itself?
"there's not a lot of them being sold' for sure.
Apple won't call it a netbook though. It will come out as the Macbook Mini.
Take off the screen and that's about what I'd like for the Mac Mini. A trackpad and bring your own display.
This means nothing as far as I'm concerned. Sometimes you have to ignore all rumors and think for yourself. "What could Apple be thinking?" When I think that I see "tablet". That will be their netbook. That that they won't release a netbook too, a year or two later. All bets say tablet to me.