Acer: We aren’t phasing out our netbooks after all

Posted on January 20th, 2011 John Burns

Acer claims that recent reports that they are to “phase out” netbook production in favour of tablet devices, are down to a translation error.

Comments made by Lu Bing-hsian, Taiwan area sales manager for Acer, have been taken out of context according to the PC giant; Acer will continue to be active in both markets.

Acer sought to clarify their position with a press release, stating that “as PCs are no longer used to create content but are more and more becoming consumption tools, new devices and new form factors are appearing .This means that the range of devices available to users is getting wider and tablets are just another piece of the mosaic.”

The press release was summed up with the sentence: “Therefore, tablets will find their space next to netbooks and notebooks.”

So the official line from Acer is to disregard Lu Bing-hsian comments; the company will NOT be phasing out its netbook production. However, sceptics will point out that the comments made no mention of an immediate cessation of netbook production; they simply hinted that, although Acer would be continuing the production of its famous netbook range, this production would be scaled back in keeping with market trends.

Acer are wise in testing the water and remaining open to new products and ideas, but we will have to observe how the netbook market performs in 2011 to see if there was a grain of truth in Bing-hsian’s “mistranslated” comments after all.

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