Quarter of business devices will be tablets by 2019

Growing demand for mobile tech to see tablet penetration rocket in the UK, IDC claims

Demand for tablets in the commercial space in western Europe is so strong that in just five years they will make up a quarter of all business computing devices.

IDC claims that in the UK, France and Germany, tablets will make up 15 per cent of the total client base in just four years, up from six per cent in the second half of 2014.

There are currently more than 10 million tablets already in use in the commercial space in western Europe across small and large enterprises. IDC claims that there will be more than 40 million tablets and two-in-ones sold over the next five years, representing a quarter of computing devices by 2019.

"The increasing mobility of the workforce and digitalisation of the work process is urging businesses, regardless of their size, to reconsider their computing infrastructure," said Marta Fiorentini, senior research analyst at IDC EMEA.

"The drivers of change are efficiency and productivity gains. In this increasingly mobile and digital environment, tablets are emerging as an ideal tool to provide employees with seamless access to content and data anywhere and anytime."

The transportation sector will lead the way in terms of tablet adoption due to the mobile nature of the industry, with government, retail and wholesale and the wider public sector also tipped to be fast adopters of the kit.

"The aviation industry, for which fuel is the largest operational expenditure, will remain a key beneficiary of the shift away from heavy traditional paper material, but growth is anticipated to gain momentum in the other verticals too, especially in hospitality and in some pockets of the public sector," IDC said. "In these three sectors, tablet penetration is expected to exceed 17 per cent by 2018."