Although Intel achieved a good market share in the tablet market in 2014 with an aggressive subsidy strategy, its overall shipments in 2015 only performed moderately instead of seeing strong growth as expected due to it cutting tablet solution subsidies and unsatisfactory smartphone solution shipments in 2015.
The main factor that impacted Intel's mobile solution shipments in 2015 was issues with its product mix. Intel planned to phase out its Bay Trail-based solutions starting the second half of 2015, but the successor, Cherry Trail's, high prices and reduced subsidies plus the entry-level SoFIA solution's problems in software and coordination with the manufacturing process, which caused chips to have high power consumption issues, deterred clients from placing more orders, according to Digitimes Research.
For 2016, Intel will continue to push its entry-level SoFIA SoC as its main product for the smartphone and tablet markets. The solution will later be integrated with a 4G baseband to help it become more competitive in the market. However, Digitimes Research believes the SoFIA 4G solution's performance will still be weaker than its competitors and Intel will need to rely on low prices and providing subsidies to sell the chips.
For the Atom-series product line, Intel will mainly push its Cherry Trail baseband-less solution. The solution is expected to be adopted in some smartphones and will see good demand from makers of dual-OS tablet products as it is one of a few available solutions on the market that offers the performance of a productivity platform.
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