HP Inc is planning to launch a new range of convertible laptops targeted at the millennial workforce in November. It is, however, yet to finalise the pricing. An HP Elitebook is priced ₹2 lakh onwards.

Called Elite Dragonfly, this range of convertible laptops is basically a combo of laptop and tablet. This, HP believes, will be the way of the future for the workforce across Asia, which is undergoing a change in employee demographics.

Hyper globalisation

“Hyper globalisation is at play, which is changing the way employees work globally,” Vinay Chandra Awasthi, VP and GM, Personal Systems Business, Asia Pacific and Japan, told BusinessLine .

HP believes that shifts in technology consumption are influencing the way companies make productivity devices such as laptops. “Next year, we will see five generations – from the baby boomers to the millennials – working together in Asia, and half of them want flexibility, agility and the ability to work from anywhere,” said Ketan Patel, VP, Commercial PC Business Unit, Personal Systems Business, Asia-Pacific and Japan.

Add-on facilities

While corporates are now offering staff the option to work from a coffee shop or an airport, their enterprises are often not equipped to handle security issues, and the devices are often complex to use. “We have built-in options, such as a shutter, which blocks the laptop camera or noise cancellation advancements that are useful on a conference call outdoors,” said Patel.

Other add-ons include AI-based malware protection software, the ability to drag and drop a file from a smartphone to the PC, and a technology that protects sensitive information on the computer screen, by making it difficult for onlookers to view from the sides.

These developments are happening at a time when the PC market (including desktop, notebook and workstation) shipped 3.4 million units in the second quarter of 2019, a 49.2 per cent year-on-year increase, according to research firm IDC. This was largely due to a deal from the Tamil Nadu government, which is distributing laptops to students and commercial businesses refreshing Windows 10 PCs.

Market share

HP had a strong quarter across the consumer and commercial segments, but slipped to second spot, with an overall market share of 22.4 per cent. It lagged behind Lenovo, whose market share was 46.2 per cent. Also, the printing business, responsible for the bulk of HP's profits, in Q3 reported revenues that were down 5.3 per cent year-on-year.

(The writer was in Tokyo on the invitation of HP)

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