Dell is facing a good problem. It can't seem to keep up with the demand for the popular and newly released Chromebooks it is selling online.
The Chromebook 11 became available in December. That was just seven months ago.
Dell has not been able to keep up with all of the orders coming in for the small-footprint laptop, reports indicate. Dell has a Chromebook website for handling sales of the netbook, but the website announced it was temporarily halting sales of the item this week.
The company is reportedly asking customers to call in to try to purchase the Chromebook 11, rather than using Dell.com to complete the order. Dell told sources that the device would still be available to education customers, but is facing such strong commercial demand that the company simply can't keep up with all the orders it is receiving.
One blog pointed to a study on computer use conducted by NPD Group which found that around 35 percent of business-to-business laptop sales were Chromebooks, which are powered by Google's operating platform. Windows has dominated the market, but recently Google has become a power player in the productivity landscape as well, particularly in mobile environments.
The increase, noted in the study, showed a 250 percent jump in those types of sales. Acer, HP and Samsung also provide notebook options for Chromebooks. Dell, however, is a popular brand and it looks like it is having trouble maintaining all that status, at least for now.
The company reported it will again be offering the machines for sale online but did not offer a timeline.
Reports also indicate that Microsoft might still come out swinging, offering a host of cheaper Windows 8 offerings to compete with the popular Chromebook.
HP is reportedly working on a $200 model that would give Google a run for its money on competing operating systems. Dell is one company reportedly involved with the Open Interconnect Consortium, a group trying to get devices better-connected to the Internet of Things by creating a wireless communications standard for it.
Maybe the company underestimated the popularity Chromebooks would have. Dell, despite its popularity and committment, will have to boost productivity or deal with this problem any way it can, including halting sales for the short term. More than 20 other Chromebooks are expected by the end of the year, however. Can they compete with Dell?
