Report: The Wintel Era is Finally Declining

As much as the two dominated our computing experience, the significance of both is "waning," says market research firm IHS.

If the computer market is defined as PC, smartphone and tablet, then IHS expects Microsoft's OS share to drop from 44-percent in 2011 to just 33-percent in 2016, and Intel's processor share to drop from 41-percent to 29-percent. But if forecast becomes reality and we assume that Intel's announcements to play a bigger role in smartphone and tablet markets (including neighboring segments such as the automotive and TV market) can now be considered the expanded PC market, this scenario may cause some headaches during Intel's board meetings.

In the end, Intel's business model as a chip maker is to sell more chips every year. We also know that Intel does not like to settle for second place, yet the largest part of the "computer market" may not be Intel-based, which could undermine the power and influence Intel has in the market today.

 "Microsoft and Intel once marched shoulder to shoulder, dominating the PC market with their closely tied operating system and microprocessor technologies," said Craig Stice, senior principal analyst compute platforms at IHS. "In the PC segment, Wintel extracted the majority of the profits, controlled every move and compelled all other players to either comply or risk being forced out of the game. While still an overwhelming influence in their respective markets, the tables have turned for Microsoft and Intel."

IHS believes that Intel has captured only 6- to 8-percent of market share in the mobile handset processor revenue business, and this has been mainly due to its acquisition of Infineon's wireless business -- Microsoft currently has 2-percent of the mobile devices OS business. In a response to the threat, IHS said that Intel has gone "back to its bread and butter, the notebook, by making a complete overhaul of the system to make it ultrathin, ultraportable, and ultramobile" as well as leveraging Google's Android for its Atom SoCs in smartphones and tablets. Similarly, Microsoft is opening Windows to ARM processor makers.

"Wintel now is playing in a new computer market that is a composite of the PC, smartphone and media tablet segments," Stice said. "While this may be a non-traditional way of looking at the PC market, tradition has gone out the window. The smartphone influenced the tablet, the tablet influenced the PC, the PC wants to become more like a tablet and the tablet more like a PC. It’s a vicious circle in which both Intel and Microsoft must take part, but they are losing control of the game and how it’s played. The Wintel camp is not accustomed to following, but with both companies being excluded of the two fastest-growing markets, they are in catch-up mode."

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  • obsama1
    I'm tired of the ARM fanboys saying ARM will dominate and Intel will fail. In phones, ARM will reign. For tablets, probably a 50-50 split between ARM and x86. In the notebook/ultrabook market, most people would go for x86. For desktop, ARM can't touch x86. Intel and MS will be here for a long time.
    Reply
  • math1337
    ARM isn't taking on the desktop/notebook competition anytime soon. Even if there's little growth there, it IS a mature market, and is going to stay solid for a long time. Smartphones will probably slow a bit, and as the market saturates, have to subsist on a biannual upgrade cycle.

    Arm is the heavyweight champ of the mobile world, but Intel is not giving up without a fight. Not saying that anything is certain, but I expect a heated battle to start as Intel's new chips roll in.
    Reply
  • Camikazi
    Anyone who remembers the past knows not to underestimate Intel or MS, they are like sleeping giants that are very hard to wake but once they do wake you are screwed.
    Reply
  • JOSHSKORN
    Are we referring to the "Personal Computer" era or the "Personalized Computing" era?
    Reply
  • captaincharisma
    JOSHSKORNAre we referring to the "Personal Computer" era or the "Personalized Computing" era?
    what's the difference?
    Reply
  • smuggl3r
    Intel invests much more money in R&D than the ARM players. Its just a matter of time before they will rule the mobile sector too. It's all about the money.
    Reply
  • nieur
    I don't think this is gonna happen anytime soon.

    Intel will be there for long time. Anyone playing games or running compute intensive applications don't just consider performance/watt but they consider the raw performance regardless of power usage. Power consumption comes into play when there is comparison between similar performing processors. And I don't think ARM is near anywhere when it comes to raw performance.I think Intel will increase their market share in mobile segment with considerable amount in near future(medfield).

    About Microsoft normal PC user wants the simple user interface and more functionality.Enthusiast PC users want more customization and control over the Hardware and software.Windows is good for both user types. Microsoft's software environment is good blend of available opensource and closed source software.
    I think people are overlooking the features of Windows 8 while hating it's UI. One of the most important feature of W8 is boot time and shutdown time. It is also more resource friendly than Windows 7.And about UI how hard Microsoft tries to disable the start button and direct boot to desktop mode there will be hacks available within week.Windows 8 will be very good OS on smartphones. It's Success will be dependent on App developer. Any android user won't mind to switch to windows if majority of apps are available on windows 8

    so don't care what people say 'Wintel' is going to remain here for long time
    Reply
  • nieur
    I don't think this is gonna happen anytime soon.

    Intel will be there for long time. Anyone playing games or running compute intensive applications don't just consider performance/watt but they consider the raw performance regardless of power usage. Power consumption comes into play when there is comparison between similar performing processors. And I don't think ARM is near anywhere when it comes to raw performance.I think Intel will increase their market share in mobile segment with considerable amount in near future(medfield).

    About Microsoft normal PC user wants the simple user interface and more functionality.Enthusiast PC users want more customization and control over the Hardware and software.Windows is good for both user types. Microsoft's software environment is good blend of available opensource and closed source software.
    I think people are overlooking the features of Windows 8 while hating it's UI. One of the most important feature of W8 is boot time and shutdown time. It is also more resource friendly than Windows 7.And about UI how hard Microsoft tries to disable the start button and direct boot to desktop mode there will be hacks available within week.Windows 8 will be very good OS on smartphones. It's Success will be dependent on App developer. Any android user won't mind to switch to windows if majority of apps are available on windows 8

    so don't care what people say 'Wintel' is going to remain here for long time
    Reply
  • nieur
    I don't think this is gonna happen anytime soon.

    Intel will be there for long time. Anyone playing games or running compute intensive applications don't just consider performance/watt but they consider the raw performance regardless of power usage. Power consumption comes into play when there is comparison between similar performing processors. And I don't think ARM is near anywhere when it comes to raw performance.I think Intel will increase their market share in mobile segment with considerable amount in near future(medfield).

    About Microsoft normal PC user wants the simple user interface and more functionality.Enthusiast PC users want more customization and control over the Hardware and software.Windows is good for both user types. Microsoft's software environment is good blend of available opensource and closed source software.
    I think people are overlooking the features of Windows 8 while hating it's UI. One of the most important feature of W8 is boot time and shutdown time. It is also more resource friendly than Windows 7.And about UI how hard Microsoft tries to disable the start button and direct boot to desktop mode there will be hacks available within week.Windows 8 will be very good OS on smartphones. It's Success will be dependent on App developer. Any android user won't mind to switch to windows if majority of apps are available on windows 8

    so don't care what people say 'Wintel' is going to remain here for long time
    Reply
  • jhansonxi
    I don't think Intel is going to decline that much unless AMD exits the market. ARM is a core design and Intel can license it just as easily as anyone else.

    I'm unsure about M$ as they are in several large markets. Their OS is non-existant in mobile market share and Apple is increasing desktop share. Xbox is doing well against PlayStation but targets a different market than Nintendo (and Valve is working on something also). Office is facing increasing competition from OpenOffice.org and Google Docs but is not hurt much by Apple's desktop advances because of OfficeX. Their server products are fighting against cloud services (Azure isn't significant). They've shelved some things like Zune and Silverlight but these were relatively minor investments.

    My guess is that Windows Phone is dead. It will be interesting to see how much money they sink into Nokia to try to keep it alive. Their OS and server products will gradually decline, some more than others. Office will decline a bit but some of that will be made up for by OfficeX and Office365. Hard to predict what will happen in the console market.
    Reply