Due largely to the “touch friendly” nature of Windows 8 and generally competitive pricing from ODMs, DisplayBank has reported that shipments of touchscreen-equipped notebooks increased by 51.8 percent in Q1 2013 (compared to Q4 2012) to 4.57 million units.
DisplayBank has further estimated that this represents approximately 10 percent of the overall notebook market and has reported that companies from the Greater China region, including Acer, Asus and Lenovo, now aim to double the market penetration of touchscreen notebooks in the near future.
Though we have no official confirmation, it seems probable that this ambitious target may have been at least partially motivated by Intel’s inclusion of touchscreens in its 3rd Generation Ultrabook Specification and the associated increase in marketing subsidies and general assistance provided to the company’s partners.