Acer Inc (宏碁), the world’s second-biggest PC maker, yesterday warned that it would miss its revenue target this quarter as sluggish demand in Europe and the US resulted in a 10 percent quarter-on-quarter decline in revenue.
The warning came just one week after the company said that it would stick to its first-quarter forecast of 3 percent quarterly growth both in revenues and shipments.
Acer recorded revenues of NT$149.7 billion (US$5.08 billion) in the final quarter of last year. The company is scheduled to report its first-quarter results next month.
Acer also said that PC shipments would be little changed next quarter, compared with the first quarter, supported by growing shipments of its new tablet devices.
“Acer started shipping tablet PCs in March and will launch several new models in the second quarter to ramp up unit shipment,” Acer said in a statement yesterday.
Market researcher Gartner Inc projected in January that Acer would ship 11.85 million PCs in the fourth quarter of last year, down 1.8 percent from 12.08 million units shipped in the same period of 2009.
Gartner attributed the decline to weak consumer demand and reduced appetite for netbook computers.
Global PC shipments are set to grow 3.1 percent in the fourth quarter to 93.48 million units.
Acer could still safeguard its No. 2 position by seizing 12.7 percent market share in the last quarter, behind HP, which accounts for 18.8 percent, according to Gartner.
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