Intel: PC designs "not compelling enough"

PC sales are struggling because there's no "compelling" reason for people to upgrade, an Intel executive has said.

Intel has tried to push the PC market forward with Ultrabooks - thinner, more attractive laptops with new form factors and longer battery life - but last year's sales were half of what was expected.

Navin Shenoy, vice president and general manager of the Mobile Client Platform division, told analysts that PC makers weren't giving customers a reason to upgrade.

"We think the usage patterns aren't the driver for elongation [of the PC upgrade cycle]," Shenoy said, according to a report from CNet. "It's more that we haven't had products in the marketplace that were compelling in any way to the existing product, either from a form factor point of view, a battery life point of view, a security point of view, a responsiveness point of view."

With the arrival of Haswell, Intel's next-generation architecture, "now we have all of those things", said Shenoy. Haswell is expected to offer a performance boost and slash energy use, offering better battery life.

Touchscreens are one feature that will push people to upgrade, Shenoy said.

Intel added touchscreens as a requirement to Haswell Ultrabooks in January, alongside its wireless display technology. Analyst firm DisplayBank revealed earlier this week that one in ten laptops sold in the past quarter featured touchscreens, and Intel said prices of touchscreen Ultrabooks should fall to $600 by the end of the year.