AMD CEO Dirk Meyer has acknowledged that Apple’s wildly popular iPad is cannibalizing sales of netbooks, notebooks and laptops.
“Clearly, in the last quarter or two, the tablet has represented a disruption in the notebook market,” Meyer said during a recent earnings call quoted by the Associated Press.
“[Now], if you ask five people in the industry, you’ll get five different answers as to what degree there’s been cannibalization by tablets of either netbooks or notebooks.”
“[But] I personally think the answer is both. And given the pretty high price points of the iPad, there’s probably some cannibalization even of mainstream notebooks.”
Meyer also confirmed that AMD was plotting a long-term strategy to design processors for the lucrative tablet market.
“Even though [devices] like Apple’s iPad are eating into demand for laptops, AMD will hold off on investing to develop microprocessors for that market until it grows more.
“Frankly, we’re still so small in the notebook market that given all of the opportunities in front of us it doesn’t make sense for us to start turning R&D dollar spending towards the tablet market yet,” he added.
