Digitimes Research estimates that China's tablet AP shipments will reach 24.3 million units, staying flat from a quarter ago and down 29.6% on year, as related chip makers are not able to further cut their costs or achieve breakthroughs in product design and therefore, are seeing demand weakening.
MediaTek's orders from Amazon and Best Buy for the third quarter will not last into the fourth quarter and the chipmaker will see a sharp drop in shipments in the fourth quarter, with the share in China's overall tablet AP shipments dropping to 20.6%.
Intel is gradually replacing its previous-generation Bay Trail platform with Cherry Trail for the high-end segment, and the inexpensive SoFIA for the entry-level segment for the fourth quarter. However, Intel will still see an obvious decline in related shipments because the CPU giant has dramatically cut its subsidies on the APs.
Starting the fourth quarter, Digitimes Research will count Rockchip and Spreadtrum's SoFIA-based AP shipments as Intel's volume. Since SoFIA's shipments are not large enough to cover the gap created by Bay Trail's absence, Intel's share in China's overall tablet AP shipments will slide to 18.7% in the fourth quarter.
Rockchip will continue to ship ARM-based APs in the fourth quarter, but its SoFIA-based AP shipments will be the main growth driver for the chipmaker's fourth-quarter shipments.
Although Intel's tablet AP shipments in China will slump in the fourth quarter, the company will still be the second-largest supplier, while Rockchip will beat Allwinner by 2pp in market share and stayed third.
Qualcomm's partnership with Allwinner is expected to help slightly increase the adoption of Qualcomm's solutions in China; however, despite having an advantage in baseband solutions, Qualcomm's high costs are putting the company at a disadvantage to account for a large market share.