Acer To Cut Ultrabook Prices To $799-899 In 2Q12; $499 in 2013 – Company President

Digitimes’ Aaron Lee and Joseph Tsai report that Acer expects its ultrabook prices will be able to drop from US$1,000 currently to US$799-899 in the second quarter of 2012, a decline of 20%, and then drop further to US$499 in 2013 as other PC brand vendors ramp up production and mass shipping of ultrabooks in 2012, according to company president Jim Wong.

The report says that Acer currently ships 100,000 ultrabooks each month and is expected to achieve its goal of shipping 250,000-300,000 units by the end of 2011.

Addressing the current issue of hard drive shortages caused by flooding in Taiwan, Wong told Lee and Tsai that he expects Acer to only suffer a supply gap of 10-15% in the fourth quarter, far less than the overall supply gap of 30-35% estimated by hard drive players, which market watchers believe is due to hard drive players providing supply priority to brand vendors.

Although Acer’s notebook sales share has dropped from second place to fourth, Wong told Digitimes he expects the company to still have a chance to return to its prior position in 2012 based on performance in the Chinese market.

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