Michael Dell Bashes Netbooks

Dell Mini Inspiron 10v

Last Tuesday, at a industry dinner in Silicon Valley, Michael Dell said this about netbooks:

“Take a user who’s used to a 15-inch notebook and then give him a 10-inch netbook. He’ll say ‘Oh, this is so cool, it’s so lightweight.’ Then 36 hours later he’ll say the screen’s not big enough, give me my 15-inch back.”

He also went on to say that a fair amount of customers were unsatisfied with the smaller screens and lower-performance parts.

Many industry observers were surprised by Michael Dell’s statements, especially since Dell offers a variety of netbooks – and since netbooks are the only growing segment in the PC marketplace.

But I am not surprised at all.  Why not?

Netbooks were popularized by Asus, Acer and MSI.  When the first netbooks hit the market in spring/summer 2008, they were an instant hit.  These three Taiwan-based companies saw their global market share balloon as a result.

The old-school laptop OEMs got into the game late.   For them, every sale of a netbook was stealing from the sales of higher-margin traditional laptops.  They only manufacture netbooks to protect marketshare.

Dell, HP, Lenovo, Toshiba and Fujitsu all hope that the netbook craze is short-lived – and that normal business will resume soon.

My comment to the old-school laptop makers is this:

Wake up!  The world is different.  Adapt or die.