A new report from the market researchers forecasts continued “hyper-growth” for tablets. The company believes tablet sales will grow an average 25.6 percent over the next four years, reaching 381.23 million tablets sold by 2017. At that time, 60 percent of people online in North America will own a tablet.
While home continues to be the most popular place to use a tablet, work uses are becoming more common. In fact, 58 percent of tablet owners say they use the devices at their work desks. “Business applicability shows the full potential of tablets,” wrote Forrester. “A comparison of where workers leverage PCs, tablets, and smartphones shows that while PCs rule the desk, tablets rival smartphones in terms of their mobility.”
For developers, the takeaway is that optimizing apps for tablet form factors could pay big rewards as the market continues to grow. In particular, mobile development firms may want to focus on enterprise tablet apps.
