Chromebooks, the cloud notebooks backed by Google, are getting a holiday price cut. And chatter over at IDC, the research firm, suggests Chromebooks simply aren’t selling. For cloud services providers and channel partners, Chromebooks represented a potential — though unclear — path to recurring revenue from hardware. But is the Chromebook market stalling before it even had a chance to warm up?
Prices for Chromebooks, built by Acer and Samsung, now start at $299. Customers can also acquire Chromebooks as part of a three-year engagement that involves monthly fees of $20 to $30 per device. That monthly approach, called Chromebook for Business and Education, also includes Google customer support and SaaS applications.
The Chromebook buzz has evolved from blogger intrigue to blogger skepticism in recent months. In early October, Talkin’ Cloud noted that Chromebooks had apparently taken four steps forward. But perhaps I was too optimistic. More recently, InfoWorld’s Galen Gruman told readers to skip the devices. IDC, InfoWorld reported, thinks only about 300,000 Chromebook units have been shipped to retailers — compared to 31 million netbooks and 210 million laptops shipped this year.
When Chromebooks surfaced at the Google I/O conference earlier this year, Talkin’ Cloud believed the cloud-centric devices would potentially redefine the low-end PC and notebook markets. Chromebook hardware coupled with Google Apps, I initially believed, would be a compelling combination for consumers and universities — and maybe even channel partners. For its part, Google has continually refined and polished the Chromebook experience, streamlining the user interface and bolstering the Chrome Web Store with new apps.
Still, Google has said little to nothing about Chromebooks during recent earnings announcements. And the tablet craze, driven by Apple, has seemingly crushed low-end hardware rivals. Even Google has had to adjust its Chromebook messaging. Before launching Chromebooks, Google sometimes referred to the forthcoming devices as netbook-like in nature. But when tablets delivered a better user experience than netbooks, Google no longer compared Chromebooks to the netbook sector.
Now, Chromebook makers are cutting prices ahead of the holidays, and there are no official estimates from Google about Chromebook sales figures. Clearly, Acer and Samsung are holding a Chromebook sale. But is anybody buying?
The 
Chromebooks are awesome devices. I hope they catch on. I use mine all the time now – it has become my primary computer. My Windows laptop is practically a door stop since I got the Chromebook. The price cut seems to be working too. Amazon sold out of the Acer AC700 model within a few hours, and the Samsung models are now listing in their list of best selling laptops.
Gary,
How are you using the Chromebook? Personal/home or in business? If you can share any more insights I’m sure Talkin’ Cloud’s readers would find them valuable.
-jp
I think 300,000 Chromebooks sold is a realistic figure, and in line with the rankings Chromebooks achieved on Amazon’s bestsellers lists.
To put in into context, Google put it on Amazon and Best Buy’s online store without significant advertising, and at a price premium over higher specified Windows laptops, in order to ensure that only early adopters would bother to but it. In addition, the device was still lacking some essential features when they went on sale last summer, and there was no way you could try them out before buying, and they were only available at these two outlets in US and UK. Also Amazon and Best Buy sales do not include subscription sales to schools, universities, libraries and businesses, which are sold direct on subscription. Despite all this, it made 300,000 online sales in 3 months. Compare that with Windows Phone 7 devices which sold similar numbers despite a massive and expensive advertising effort and PR push, and despite being widely available at retail outlets. Customer satisfaction is very high apart from a few who seem to have bought the device thinking that it was a Windows netbook. No wonder Dixon’s, which is the UK’s biggest computer and electronics device retailer, is claiming that one in ten computers sold in UK at the end of 2012 will be Chromebooks. Personally, I think it will take longer than that to reach 10% marketshare, mainly because I don’t see Google marketing Chromebooks very aggressively until 2013 when sufficient extensions, plug-ins are available and sufficient third party web apps support offline capability ate present to make up for lack of offline applications. Also, a number of key technologies – WebGL, Portable Native Client, etc are still beta.
SMP: Thanks for pinpointing some key technologies that could eventually give Chromebooks a boost. I concede: A few weeks ago, amid the Chromebook price cuts, I wondered if Chromebooks struggling and potentially on Google’s cut list. But more recently Google has been working with Google Apps authorized resellers on the Chromebook push, so my faith in Google’s commitment has been somewhat restored.
-jp
It may take longer for businesses to adopt Chromebooks, but one market in which they are making some progress is in education. For example, the Richland school district in South Carolina is providing Chromebooks to thousands of students and staff.
This district wanted students and staff to be able to use their Chromebooks to access Windows applications running on VMware View virtual desktops. So they enhnaced their deployment with Ericom AccessNow, an HTML5 RDP client that enables Chromebook users to connect to any RDP host, including Terminal Server (RDS Session Host), physical desktops or VDI virtual desktops – and run their Windows applications and desktops in a browser.. It does not require Java, Flash, Silverlight, ActiveX, or any other underlying technology to be installed on end-user devices – an HTML5 browser is all that is required.
Here are the details:
http://www.ericom.com/pr/pr_111206.asp?URL_ID=708
Note: I work for Ericom