Acer Now No. 1 in Netbook Sales

Per DisplaySearch, the netbook category grew at more than 160% Q/Q in Q3’08 as most of the top tier brands have now entered the market. Asus, which had essentially created the market in late 2007, lost significant share as Acer surged to the top spot, capturing more than 35% of this market.

The market started in late 2007 with the introduction of the Asus Eee PC 701 4G and sold less than 1 million units. But by the end of 2008, sales its expected to exceed 14 million units and is poised for for dramatic growth, propelled by low prices and a user experience that much more closely mirrors a typical PC, as the majority of these devices run Windows XP or a Linux OS.

With the lone exception of Apple, all of the top 10 PC brands have entered the mini-note PC market, initially as a response to the competitive threat posed by Asus, but also to satisfy demand from customers.

Significantly, per 3rd quarter 2008 sales, Acer now leads the netbook market with 38.3%, ahead of pioneer Asus, which has 30.3%. HP came in third at 5.7%, followed by MSI, 5.7%, Dell 2.8%, OLPC 2.3, Medion, 2.3%, Kohjinsha, 1.0%, Intel Classmate variants, 1.0%, Lenovo, 0.7%, Toshiba, 0.5%, and the rest, a combined 9.1%.