Touch screens

The arrival of touch devices for Windows 8, beyond the Surface and the occasional brave like Asus or Sony, certainly is having a significant delay , at least for anxious geeks like the one who writes these lines.

Although in a previous article I did an analysis of some of the possible causes that could be summarized as "If you don't want to sell, I don't want to buy", it is also true that reality is always more complex than expected.

And that there is an important part in the manufacture of new generation touch screens that must be added to the problems for the distribution of this hardware.

The differences with the SmartPhone market

The first thing to note, as the comparison can be misguided, is that smartphone screen manufacturing has little to do with the laptop touch screen industry.

The former, being a more mature market due to the continued demand from multiple brands, offer the integrator not only more technological possibilities – and their different prices/features/quality-, but also production times that range between two and three weeks per unit.

It is also important that orders for this type of screens occur throughout the year in a more or less homogeneous way. Allowing integrators to place orders with manufacturers that get priority in the production chains.

And that manufacturers are located all over the planet, in abundant numbers and, as I said before, with very varied.

The drawbacks of touch screens for laptops

On the other hand, manufacturers of touch screens for laptops are much fewer than those of mobile phones, and they are concentrated in a few geographic areas. Being, to make matters worse, a more seasonal demand; which causes production orders to have a lower priority on assembly lines.

Also, the construction of the 13” and 15” screens of the laptops multiply the technical complexity, manufacturing costs and performance. This causes production times to be extended up to more than 8 weeks – more than double that in the case of smartphones.

For example, the manufacturer TPK has announced this year that it will be able to supply 2.5 million units per month, about 30 million per year. However, the expected market for touchscreen laptops for 2013 is estimated at around 200 million devices. As a result, PK will be able to meet only 15% of global demand

Cost and supply chain

To complicate the equation, the final price for the buyer is also exceeding $100 per unit, which makes touch devices very expensive, and which is requiring technological research to reduce the cost and compete with Android or iOS devices.

So, in summary, the two variables that contribute their two cents to the delay in the arrival of touchscreen laptops with Windows 8 are: the price of the screens and the inability of the supply chain to meet market demand.

And so in this past 2012 the penetration of this type of hardware has not reached 2%, and the forecast for 2013, if there is no major change and new manufacturers arrive with new and greater technology production capacity, would not exceed 12%.

Touch keep waiting.

Via | DisplaySearch