Analyst puts total Nexus 7 sales at just 4.6 million
 

Analyst Benedict Evans has come up with a rather interesting take on sales figures for the Nexus 7. Using newly released data from Asus, he has worked out that between 4.5 and 4.8 million Nexus 7 tablets were sold last year.

Evans believes 2.2 million units were sold in late Q2 and Q3, followed by 2.4 million during Q4, TechCrunch reports. In contrast, shipments of Apple's iPad mini, which only launched in Q4, have already crossed the 10 million mark. What's more, Apple managed to sell 22.9 million iPads, including 9.7-inch models, in Q4.

It is worth noting that Google does not release sales figures for Nexus gear, so analysts are the best, or should we say only way of estimating sales. The numbers are relatively low, but then again no Android tablet has ever come close to the iPad.

Google's Nexus program has a history of poor execution, as the last four launches were marred by poor availability.

In fact, the Nexus 7 was the least troublesome of them all, but it still averaged fewer than a million units sold per month. The Nexus 4 was met with huge demand, but for some reason Google only managed to sell a million in three months, while Nexus 10 shipments seem so low that analysts can't be bothered coming up with any figures.

The situation could change, though. The Wall Street Journal backed up rumours pointing to Google's new sales strategy. Google is apparently working on launching retail stores in the US, joining Apple and Microsoft. It could be the first step in transforming Google (or Nexus) into a consumer electronics brand, but with such slow sales and availability problems, we wonder what Google plans to sell in said stores? Chromebooks?

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