MWC 2024: Will traditional PCs be unified with AI wings and sales take off?

[Gearbest Technology]The 2024 MWC conference is a feast for the technology industry. Amid the hustle and bustle of the first day, we witnessed many eye-catching highlights. Gearbestnoticed that mobile phone manufacturers are still keen on seeking new business growth points. Whether it is the “full ecology of people, cars and homes” promoted by Xiaomi, or Transsion's pursuit of the high-end market, we have seen the innovation and vitality of the mobile phone industry.

Under the craze of AI, mobile phone manufacturers are gearing up and trying to integrate AI technology into every corner of mobile phones. From AI assistants to more complex AI applications, and even to platform-level AI empowerment, mobile phone manufacturers are creating unprecedented sparks with AI.

MWC 2024: Will traditional PCs be unified with AI wings and sales take off?

At the same time, what we cannot ignore is the current situation of the global notebook market. According to the latest report from TrendForce, global notebook computer shipments will decrease by 10.8% year-on-year to 166 million units in 2023. The notebook market seems to be in trouble under the double attack of tablets and smartphones. So, can AI PC be the life-saving straw that saves the notebook market? This will be something we'll be watching closely during MWC.

In addition, Gearbestwill discuss several major new trends in the technology industry based on the new products and new technologies that emerged at the MWC conference. The most obvious one is the integration of 5G and AI technology, which is also an important topic at this year’s MWC.

Whether it is the new business exploration of mobile phone manufacturers or the widespread application of AI technology, we can see the important direction of the future technology industry. In this regard, Gearbestlaunched the “MWC 2024” series of special topics, and the focus of this article is “Can AI PC save traditional PC manufacturers?”

With the rise of AI, there are more and more “AI+XXX” products, and in the digital industry, such new product positioning is everywhere. AI mobile phones, AI assistants, AI digital humans, etc. have become hot products in the current market. It is not surprising that the AI ​​PC appeared at MWC this time.

The PC industry is in a cold winter

When the epidemic first broke out in 2020, the rise of home office and online education brought about a wave of small prosperity in the PC (personal computer) industry. However, as the epidemic is gradually controlled and unblocked, starting in 2022, the global PC market will begin to enter a cold winter. Data from authoritative statistical organizations Canalys and IDC have confirmed this.

According to Canalys statistics, PC shipments in 2022 will be 285.1 million units, a 16% decrease compared to 2021; and IDC data shows that PC shipments in 2022 will be 292.3 million units, a 16.5% decrease compared to 2021.

In 2023, which has just passed, this situation has still not improved. Data released by Canalys shows that for the whole of 2023, the total number of global PC shipments will be 247 million units, a 13% decrease from 2022. Although the decline has narrowed, it still exceeds 10%. IDC's figures are also not optimistic. According to its statistics, the total PC sales in 2023 will be 259.5 million units, a decrease of 13.9% compared with the previous year.

But behind the bad data, there is also some good news, that is, the performance in Q4 2023 has begun to gradually pick up. Among them, various manufacturers regard AI PC as the main driving force for sales growth in 2024.

What is AI PC?

If you like to watch ghost movies at Station B, you may be familiar with the name AIPC. This 1,699 yuan laptop that was once popular on major TV stations has now become a popular material in the ghost zone. Of course, the AI ​​PC mentioned here does not refer to it, but the abbreviation of Artificial Intelligence Personal Computer.

According to reports, the concept of AI PC is said to have originated from Intel. In September last year, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger proposed the name in Silicon Valley. From Intel's perspective, AI PC is a PC that can provide AI functions. AI can closely collaborate with PCs through the cloud, or run large language models independently on the computer, thereby fundamentally changing and reshaping the PC user experience and releasing people's productivity and creativity.

After this concept was proposed, many related companies in the PC industry chain, such as Lenovo, Samsung, Google and Nvidia, chose to follow up. Suddenly, some AI processors integrated with dedicated NPUs and AI PCs equipped with them have become the focus of the market. At the MWC 2024 exhibition, manufacturers including Lenovo, Asus, Honor and other manufacturers also brought their own new AI PC products, making AI PC a popular product at the exhibition.

Prospects and advantages of AI PC

Compared with traditional PCs, the biggest difference between AI PCs is the addition of the word “AI”, which also shows that AI PCs will have greater advantages than previous computers in the field of artificial intelligence, especially in large models.

Traditional laptops in the past can also run large language models locally, but they mainly perform calculations through GPU graphics cards, and the larger the amount of data, the higher the performance requirements for the graphics card. Therefore, if you want to get a good user experience, you must use a flagship graphics card, which is obviously too high for the vast majority of users who use ordinary graphics cards. Nowadays, as chip manufacturers such as Intel, AMD, and Qualcomm begin to pay attention to AI, they have all launched AI processors. With the support of new AI processors, AI PC emphasizes universally available AI capabilities, which allows most laptops to run AI applications.

In fact, if you compare purely in terms of computing power, ordinary AI PCs may not be as good as those traditional high-performance PCs. However, at the specific application level, because AI PCs are specially optimized for AI, they are usually pre-installed with software optimized for AI functions, allowing users to enjoy the convenience brought by AI without additional configuration. At the same time, manufacturers can also quantify large models to further reduce the requirements for model running heap hardware, thereby reducing performance requirements.

Having a dedicated NPU module is also a major feature of AI PC. Large language models and pre-trained models for text generation pictures involve a large number of matrix operations during calculation. If the CPU is used for calculations, the matrix multiplication and addition processes need to be separated, which results in extremely low operating efficiency. At this time, the GPU is required to increase the speed through parallel calculations of a large number of processing units.

But after having a dedicated NPU, the situation is different. Through special circuit design, NPU can complete matrix operations in one go, with low power consumption and high efficiency. This is a great thing for products that have higher power consumption limits, such as thin and light notebooks. In addition, Intel has also launched NPU and GPU collaborative computing technology, which can bring faster generation speed with controllable power consumption when running complex large models.

From the above introduction, it is not difficult to find that the biggest advantage of AI PC is to make the localized operation of large models more efficient. This is also one of the biggest highlights of AI PC. Compared with online large models, localized large models have higher security and privacy. In the future where AI applications will become more and more frequent, personally customized locally deployed large models may become an important function of PCs.

Will AI PC become the wings for manufacturers’ sales to take off?

Since AI PC has so many benefits, will it become the password for PC manufacturers to take off in sales? At present, it seems that all major PC manufacturers are full of confidence in it.

According to IDC's latest forecast, AI PC shipments are expected to reach nearly 50 million units in 2024. By 2027, this number will climb to more than 167 million units, accounting for nearly 60% of global PC shipments. This huge number also forces manufacturers to seize the opportunities brought by this wave of AI.

At this MWC 2024, Lenovo released a series of AI PC products, such as ThinkPad T14/T14s fifth generation, ThinkPad T16 third generation, ThinkPad X12 Detachable second generation and ThinkBook 14 2-in-1 fourth generation. However, at the previous Lenovo financial report conference, Lenovo Chairman and CEO Yang Yuanqing said that he believed that the popularity of AI PC will drive the popularization of AI, but currently AI PC still faces problems such as network speed, cost and data privacy security.

Indeed, since AI PC is still a new concept, the price of related products is more expensive than the original traditional PC, which may affect the manufacturer's sales to a certain extent. In addition, if AI PC is to be thoroughly promoted, building a complete ecosystem is also an indispensable part.

According to Ablikmu Ablimiti (Amu), Vice President of Lenovo Group and Vice President of Strategy and Business Development of China, a mature AI PC should have five major characteristics. The first is to have a personal agent based on a large model, with which users can interact naturally; the second is to configure a personal local large model and knowledge base, which can be combined into a personal large model; the third is to configure hybrid AI computing power; the fourth is to be able to connect AI native applications through plug-ins; and the fifth is to have privacy and data security protection solutions.

write at the end

Generally speaking, as AI has increasingly become the future development direction, the emergence of AI PC can be said to be in line with the development trend. Has a lot of potential. However, for now, AI PC seems to be still in the concept and early stages. On the one hand, it is relatively expensive, and on the other hand, the related ecological construction is not perfect. But in the long run, AI PC will definitely become a battleground for various manufacturers, and will write a new chapter in the PC field together.

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