Dell Inc's personal computer shipments topped Hewlett-Packard's in the first quarter as worldwide demand rose because corporations and consumers increased their purchases, two market research firms said.
Dell's shipments rose 29 percent to 7.49 million units in the quarter, topping Hewlett-Packard's 6.33 million units, Gartner Inc said. IDC reported Dell's shipments at 7.68 million units, up 28 percent, compared with Hewlett-Packard's 6.42 million units, a 16 percent rise.
Overall demand rose 16.5 percent in the first quarter, IDC said. Gartner said the increase was 13.4 percent. Corporations are now replacing PCs at a strong pace and consumers want to use their PCs for photography and videos, IDC analyst Roger Kay said.
"There's excitement in the market about what consumers can do with digital entertainment," Kay said. "The strength is pretty much across the board."
Dell, which shipped the most PCs last year, has been wrestling for the top spot with Hewlett-Packard, which shipped the most in the fourth quarter because of strong sales to consumers.
New products including storage devices and expansion in Europe and China are helping Dell ship more PCs, said Neil Hand, Dell's director of worldwide enterprise marketing.
"Servers and storage and services are also helping us increase our penetrations of corporate customers," Hand said. "Our globalization efforts are continuing to bear fruit in terms of faster growth."
Dell increased its market share to 16.5 percent from 14.6 percent a year earlier. Hewlett-Packard's share rose to 14 percent from 13.6 percent a year ago, Gartner said. IDC said Dell's share rose to 18.6 percent from 16.9 percent, while Hewlett-Packard fell to 15.6 percent from 15.7 percent.
Both IDC and Gartner ranked International Business Machines Corp third, followed by Fujitsu Siemens Computers Holding BV, Europe's largest PC seller, and Acer Inc. IBM's shipments rose 20 percent to 2.24 million, while Fujitsu Siemens' climbed 13 percent to 1.83 million and Acer's rose 35 percent to 1.38 million, Gartner said.
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