The sources also mentioned that Compal is also likely to obtain Toshiba's order for such products next year, securing solid growth momentum in its tablet PC shipment for 2011.

Success of Apple Inc's iPad has aroused PC brands' attention to business opportunities in the segment for tablets, with Acer, Samsung, Toshiba and Dell all having plans to launch their models so far.

In fact, Acer has placed its order with Comapl for X86 tablet PC, which is built with Intel's processor and Microsoft's Windows 7 and scheduled for promotion in the fourth quarter of this year, to pave the way for launch of its Android 3.0-based model in the first quarter of next year.

Seen as Acer's ace in the hole to compete against iPad, the Android 3.0-based tablet will be available with a 7-inch or 10-inch screen, and adopt either Qualcomm's Snapdragon or NVIDIA's Tegra2 processor.

IDC (International Data Corp.) projects the annual compound growth rate of global tablet PC shipment at 40% in the coming five years, meaning that fierce competition among global PC brands has been triggered in the tablet PC segment. This is expected to eventually benefit a couple of Taiwanese PC makers, including Compal, Quanta Computer Inc. and Pegatron Corp.