India's PC market grew 15.8% to 3.1 million units in Q3, says IDC report

The PC market in India grew 15.8 per cent year-on-year with shipment touching 3.1 million units in September quarter, research firm IDC said on Thursday.

The shipment volume, which includes desktops, notebooks, and workstations, stood at 2.7 million units in the July-September 2018 period, IDC said.

"This growth was mainly driven by the second phase of shipments to the Electronics Corporation of Tamil Nadu Ltd (ELCOT) under its ongoing initiative of free distribution of laptops in the state. Also, as Windows 7 is near to its scheduled end in early 2020, corporate and enterprise users accelerated their upgrades to Windows 10," it added.

Lenovo led the tally with 28.5 per cent share in September 2019 quarter, followed by HP (26.4 per cent), Dell Technologies (19.7 per cent), Acer (11.9 per cent) and Asus (5.3 per cent).

The commercial segment witnessed 39 per cent year-on-year growth as vendors shipped a total of 1.7 million units in the quarter under review. Excluding the ELCOT deal, the commercial segment grew 15.7 per cent annually, driven by strong traction for both desktops and notebooks.

The consumer segment, however, was down by 4.2 per cent from the same quarter a year ago. It grew 49 per cent sequentially driven by multiple mega online festivals and Diwali offers.

"As we see consumers shifting entertainment and content consumption to smartphones, PCs are becoming a conscious purchase in India. Consumers are comfortable to wait for discounts and offers while looking to buy or upgrade their PCs," IDC India Associate Research Manager Jaipal Singh said.

Looking at opportunities, branded PC gaming is a growth area in the next few quarters, he added.

"Although India's gaming market is dominated by mobile phones, gamers have already started preferring PCs for a more immersive experience as their best alternate," Singh said.

The desktop category saw a 10.6 per cent y-o-y growth in its shipments, mainly contributed by Windows 10 refresh buying from the banking sector.

Notebooks grew 18 per cent annually on the back of education deals as well as growth in both corporate and SMB segments, as these enterprises scaled up their purchases for Windows 10 migrations.