SPENDING on personal tech gadgets is taking a hit from the economic slowdown in China and the strong U.S. dollar, researchers from the Consumer Technology Association (CTA) said.

    The CTA forecast that US$950 billion will be spent globally on consumer electronics this year in a 2 percent drop from the US$969 billion spent last year, while the number of actual units shipped will see little change.

    “We are seeing pretty flat demand while we wait for new innovations to reach consumers,” CTA senior director of market research Steve Koenig said as the premier Consumer Electronics Show prepared to get under way in Las Vegas.

    Koenig cautioned that technology spending comparisons were “challenged” by a very strong dollar and prices dropping on market mainstays such as smartphones and tablets.

    “We really see the global economy starting to get back on track as we wrestle with a range of issues,” Koenig said.

    “I think the biggest thing we are starting to come to grips with is the normalization of the slowdown in China.”

    Smartphones and tablet computers were expected to account for 46 percent of the money spent this year on consumer electronics, but new categories such as “wearables,” drones and virtual reality gear should be making their presence felt in the market, according to Koenig.

    When mobile computers such as laptops are included with smartphones and tablets, the share of sales in the year was predicted to be 58 percent or some US$551 billion.

    “Over half a trillion U.S. dollars,” Koenig said of the forecast. “I give you technology’s triumvirate: laptops, smartphones and tablets.”

    He wondered aloud regarding the potential for tablets to be squeezed out by large-screen smartphones and portable computers such as the Lenovo Yoga, which are designed with screens that can be removed and used as touch-controled tablets.

    Smartphone shipments were predicted to cool a bit this year, growing about 8 percent to 1.4 billion devices.

    Smartphone adoption is being pushed by progressively lower prices, which is especially important in markets such as China, Africa, and the Middle East, where high-end handsets are out of reach for many people.

    Meanwhile, the overall category of wearable computers that includes smart watches should continue its “meteoric rise” and there will be “no shortage”of wearable computing gadgets on the CES show floor that officially opened yesterday, according to Koenig. (SD-Agencies)