Amazon's Kindle Fire Shipments Slump In Q1 2012: IDC

Is The Kindle Fire Fizzling?

By Poornima Gupta

SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc's

Market share of Kindle Fire, which was launched with much fanfare by Amazon in November, fell to about 4 percent in January-March period from 16.8 percent in the fourth quarter, according to research firm IDC.

"The tablet market in general has been very seasonal," Bob O'Donnell, IDC's program vice president, said. "At $199 it (Kindle) was much more of an impulse buy during the holidays. You don't get much of an impulse buy during Q1."

Consumer device giant Apple Inc

Rival Samsung Electronics

But overall, tablet shipments worldwide were a lower-than-expected 17.4 million units, representing a 1.2 million unit shortfall from IDC's projections as a steep drop in shipments of Android-based tablets offset Apple's strong sales in the quarter.

The total still represents a year-over-year growth rate of 120 percent, the IDC said.

The hotly contested and increasingly crowded tablet arena is expected to get more players in the coming months and years. Some industry executives say that sales of the mobile device will eat into personal computer sales and could even outsell them.

(Reporting By Poornima Gupta; Editing by Tim Dobbyn)

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