Industry reports released on Tuesday showed that PC shipments slid anew in the third quarter as lifestyles continued to shift to smartphones and tablets.
Worldwide PC shipments in the third quarter of this year totaled 68.9 million units, a 5.7 percent decline from the same period a year earlier, according to preliminary estimates by Gartner Inc.
International Data Corp (IDC) put the figure even lower in a Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker report that said just shy of 68 million units shipped in a year-on-year drop of 3.9 percent.
It was the eighth quarter in a row that PC shipments have dropped, marking the longest duration of decline in the history of the industry, Gartner said.
“There are two fundamental issues that have impacted PC market results: the extension of the lifetime of the PC caused by the excess of consumer devices and weak PC consumer demand in emerging markets,” Gartner principal analyst Mikako Kitagawa said.
Kitagawa cited a Gartner personal technology survey indicating that most consumers own and use at least three different types of computing devices, with PCs low on the priority list.
Challenges faced by PC makers include weak back-to-school demand and ongoing cool interest by consumers in general, especially those in emerging markets, Gartner said.
“In emerging markets, PC penetration is low, but consumers are not keen to own PCs,” Kitagawa said. “Consumers in emerging markets primarily use smartphones or ‘phablets’ for their computing needs, and they don’t find the need to use a PC as much as consumers in mature markets.”
Chinese titan Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) clung to its spot as top PC maker with about 21 percent of the market, but US-based HP Inc pulled almost even, according to both industry trackers.
Lenovo lost ground during the quarter, while second-placed HP and third-placed Dell Inc both gained.
Slow growth in China, a huge market for Lenovo, made it tough for the company to defend a lead it established in 2013, IDC reported.
The quarter was the sixth consecutive year-on-year decline in PC shipments for Lenovo, which continued to outpace the market and made strong gains in key markets such as the US, IDC said.
IDC said that the quarterly results were actually better than it had expected and that PC vendors were actually rebuilding inventories after cutting them for a year or more.
“We are very pleased to see some improvement in the market,” IDC worldwide PC trackers and forecasting vice president Loren Loverde said. “Industry efforts to update products to leverage new processors and operating systems, to deliver a better computing experience encompassing more mobile, secure and faster systems, and to accelerate PC replacements have been critical.”
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