After showing that it can bring leading Android smartphone manufacturers to their knees, rising handset OEM Xiaomi is expected to tap in to a completely different market. That happens to be the notebook market; a market which is currently being dominated by Lenovo, which is also a top smartphone manufacturers in the world.
Xiaomi Will Partner With Foxconn And Inventec To Begin Mass Producing Notebooks
While it is highly surprising that Xiaomi would decide to branch out to whole new market, we had reported that the tech firm was expected to tap in to the mechanical gaming keyboard market, indicating that Xiaomi is looking to branch out to the PC business step by step. In order to bring its plan to fruition, the company plans to team up with both Inventec and Foxconn, which are going to be responsible for the mass production phase. However, the exact time period as to when the mass production phase will begin is currently unknown.
Furthermore, there are no details available as to what kind of hardware will be present inside these portable machines. However, seeing as how AMD’s mobile processors are much cheaper compared to Intel, we might get to see these processors in the upcoming notebooks. However, before Xiaomi chooses AMD to be its chief supplier of laptop processors, MediaTek is aiming to dominate the Chromebook market by incorporating its chips in to machines that are only going to retail for $100.
As far as options goes, Xiaomi has a ton of them. The only question remains is that which companies will have to partner with the Chinese firm in order to roll out notebooks that carry an amazing price/performance ratio. The source did manage to state that the upcoming notebook from Xiaomi is going to carry a 15 inch screen running an undisclosed resolution. It also stated that the machine will be running Linux, although Windows will be the more preferred platform since it has the highest market share.
The price of the upcoming notebook is going to be approximately CNY 2,999, which is equivalent to $471 and the product is going to take on machines that are priced in between CNY 4,000-6,000, which is equal to $629.30-$943.95. If this pricing model is actually followed by Xiaomi, then Lenovo is going to suffer the most, seeing as how it possesses a market share that is in between 20-25 percent in the geographical region of China.
We are going to have to see how this plays along, but for now, Xiaomi is going to be focusing on smartphones and tablets.
