PC market dips by 30% to 2.9 mn units in Jan-Mar quater, HP leads

Shipments of personal computers in declined by about 30% on-year in January-March 2023 quarter to 29.92 lk units due to slowing of demand in both consumer and commercial segment, IDC said

Shipments of personal computers in Indian market declined by about 30 per cent year-on-year in the January-March 2023 quarter to 29.92 lakh units due to slowing of demand in both consumer and commercial segment, market research firm IDC said on Tuesday.

According to International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Personal Computing Device Tracker, 42.82 lakh PC units were shipped to India in March 2022 quarter.

"The India traditional PC market, inclusive of desktops, notebooks, and workstations, continued to drop shipping only 2.99 million units, a decline of 30.1 per cent year-over-year (YoY) in 1Q23 (Jan-Mar)," according to new data from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Personal Computing Device Tracker.

According to the IDC report, the demand for desktops was positive during the March 2023 quarter but the notebook category witnessed another weak quarter as it declined by 40.8 per cent YoY.

The consumer segment declined by 36.1 per cent YoY primarily due to slowing demand and low market sentiment, and the commercial segment declined by 25.1 per cent YoY due to reduced or delayed procurement by enterprises and SMEs, the report said.

PC demand has been sluggish over the last couple of quarters. While SMEs are delaying procurement due to the credit crunch, enterprises are reducing or delaying procurement out of recession fears. The PC market in India is expected to stay sluggish for a few more months and start recovering from the late fourth quarter of 2023 onwards," IDC India, South Asia and ANZ, Associate Vice President, Devices Research, Navkendar Singh said.

Government and education were the only segments seeing positive traction in the March 2023 quarter.

"Procurement from government bodies propelled the segment to grow by 25.2 per cent YoY, while fulfillment of the Gujarat education order helped the education segment grow by 65.6 per cent YoY," the report said.

Despite a 30.2 per cent decline in shipments, HP led the market with 33.8 per cent market share--which is more than double the share of its closest competitor Lenovo, 15.7 per cent, during the reported quarter.

Lenovo PC shipment declined by 37.5 per cent to 4.7 lakh units from 7.52 lakh units on YoY basis.

Dell market share declined to 13.9 per cent from 19.4 per cent on YoY basis. Its PC shipments almost halved to 4.17 lakh units during March 2023 from 8.3 lakh units a year ago.

Acer Group (12.3 per cent share) and Asus PC (6.6 per cent share) shipments declined by 12.5 per cent and 25.9 per cent respectively during the March 2023 quarter on YoY basis.