Global PC shipments flat in Q2, says Gartner

Worldwide PC shipments totalled 87.5 million units in the second quarter of 2012 showing flat growth for the seventh consecutive quarter on the back of rising interest in competing smartphones and media tablets, research firm Gartner today said.

According to preliminary results by Gartner, the PC shipments dipped 0.1% to 87.46 million units in April-June 2012 quarter from 87.55 million units in the same period a year ago.

"Uncertainties in the economy in various regions, as well as consumer's low interest in PC purchases, were some of the key influencers of slow PC shipment growth. In Q2 2012, the PC market suffered through its seventh consecutive quarter of flat to single-digit growth," Gartner Principal Analyst Mikako Kitagawa said in a statement.

Consumers are less interested in spending on PCs as there are other technology product and services, such as the latest smartphones and media tablets that they are purchasing, Gartner said.

"This is more of a trend in the mature market as PCs are highly saturated in these markets," Kitagawa said.
HP continued to be leader in worldwide PC shipments, accounting for 14.9% of the market, with 13.03 million units in shipment. Its share has however fallen from 16.9% in second quarter of 2011.

Some of HP's disappointing results were due to internal issues from the organisational changes and HP's PC business has not been back to pre re-structuring level yet.

The company also faced aggressive pricing from Lenovo in the professional market, and threats from companies such as Asus and Samsung in the already crowded consumer markets, Gartner said.

Lenovo, which saw significant growth in Europe, Middle East and Africa, saw its share increasing to 14.7% with 12.82 million units in Q2 2012 from 12.7% share (11.16 million units).

Acer, with 9.64 million units shipments, had a market share of 11%. Dell, on the other hand, lost market share.
Dell's market share stood at 10.7% at the end of June (9.34 million units) as against a market share of 12.1% (10.57 million units) in April-June 2011 quarter, Gartner said.

Asus showed the strongest growth among the top five vendors worldwide, as its shipments increased 38.6% in the second quarter of 2012. Its market share stood at seven% at the end of June 2012.

Asus' strong growth came from EMEA and US markets and it did well at diversifying the product portfolio: starting with mini-notebook expansion, then quickly moving to the mid- to high-end notebook market, Gartner said.

The Asia Pacific PC market grew two% with shipments reaching 31.8 million units.