As ultrabooks from brand vendors such as Acer, Lenovo and Hewlett-Packard (HP) are all recently seeing price drops in the North America, sources from retail channel believe that the PC vendors are dropping their ultrabook prices to promote upcoming new ultrabook models, that are set to launch soon after Intel releases its new Ivy Bridge processors.

Acer's S3 ultrabook equipped with a hard disc drive has already seen its price drop to US$799 in North America, while Lenovo and HP's ultrabook prices also recently dropped 25% and 21%, respectively.

HP is already set to launch its new Ultrabook Envy Spectra 14 in Taiwan this week with Acer and Lenovo's new ultrabooks are set to release in the second quarter.

Although ultrabooks are unlikely to achieve Intel's goal of having a share of 40% in total notebook shipments by the end of 2012, as more new ultrabook products will appear in the retail channel, the average price should quickly drop to US$699-799 in the second quarter from the current US$1,000 price, the sources noted.