In the third quarter of 2013, global tablet shipments reached 35.68 million units, up 15.3% sequentially and 34.6% on year, driven mainly by non-iPad tablet shipments, which reached 20.08 million units, up 22.9% from the previous quarter and accounting for 56.3% of the total volume, according to Digitimes Research's latest figures.
Apple released the iPad Air and the iPad mini with Retina Display on October 22, but the iPad mini with Retina Display did not start shipping from suppliers until the end of October due to supply shortages of the high-definition panel. As a result, iPad shipments in the third quarter only grew 6.8% sequentially, reaching 15.6 million units and accounting for 43.7% of global shipments.
Taiwan's proportion in global tablet shipments dropped further to 63% in the third quarter as Samsung Electronics and Lenovo have been increasing their in-house production of tablets, Digitimes Research said.
Apple and Samsung were the top-two tablet vendors in the third quarter. Samsung's market share grew to almost 30%. Google ranked third thanks to its second-generation Nexus 7. Lenovo, Acer and Asustek Computer were number 4-6, while Amazon was ranked number seven.
As for application processors (APs), Marvell was the second-largest AP supplier in the third quarter as it has become the main supplier of Samsung's tablet products. Intel was the third-largest due to orders from Samsung and for Windows-based tablets, followed by MediaTek and Qualcomm.
