Chinese smartphone maker and leading unicorn Xiaomi, Inc. may be expanding its horizons into the laptop market, according to a report published Wednesday.

Bloomberg Business quotes “people with direct knowledge of the matter,” stating that Xiaomi’s notebook may go on sale in the first quarter of 2106 and will compete with such premium computers as Apple’s MacBook Air and Lenovo’s ThinkPad.

The company is said to be in talks with Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. to supply memory chips for the planned device, and could potentially tap Samsung to provide displays as well.

Other details of the laptop were not provided, but if Xiaomi remains true to the form it has popularized through its wildly successful (in China) smartphones the laptop will offer high-end specs at a bargain basement price.

Shrinking market

While a move into laptops by Xiaomi is a welcomed one, it’s an interesting move none the less given shipments of laptops and PCs, in general, continue to decline.

A Gartner report in July predicted that PC sales are set to decline 4.5 percent this year compared to last year, down to 300 million units, a 1.3 percent drop from Gartner’s previous estimates for this year.

The report noted that the continued slowdown in PC purchases in Western Europe, Russia, and Japan were the main factor behind the reduced forecast, and although it didn’t specify whether the trend was reflected in China, it did note that smartphone market in the Middle Kingdom had come off the boil reflecting a maturing marketplace.

Xiaomi has had nearly a blessed run with everything it has brought to market, including its line of wearable fitness trackers that saw the primarily emerging markets focused company commencing sales in the United States for the first time.

There’s no question that it knows its market and how to cater to it, but laptops are a completely different game to selling smartphones; that said if any company, let alone a unicorn, can pull off a market-changing laptop, Xiaomi could and there will be many looking forward to seeing exactly what it brings to market.

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