The global PC market has started to move into recovery
mode as shipments in the second quarter declined less than analysts
expected but the bad news is that the EMEA market has yet to hit
rock bottom.
Gartner today revealed 68.1 million desktops, notebooks and x86
servers were sold worldwide, representing a decline of 5%, far
better than the 9.8% fall the market watcher had initially
anticipated.
However, EMEA sales declined 10.9%, more than twice the global
average with shipments totalling 20.6 million units.
“The EMEA PC market in the second quarter of 2009 saw continued
weakness,” said Ranjit Atwal, principal analyst at Gartner.
“Despite some return to seasonality trends, the EMEA PC market
has not yet bottomed out,” he added.
Hewlett-Packard continued to lead the vendor pack with 19.2%
market share as sales declined 2.2%.
“HP has been undertaking cost cutting measures through the first
half of 2009 resulting in the merger of its professional and
consumer divisions and the subsequent reduction of products in both
segments,” said Atwal.
Only Acer managed to post growth out of the top five vendors in
the region, growing 21.6% which took its market share to 15.1% and
consolidated its second place position.
In third spot, Dell saw sales drop 23.4%, while Toshiba and ASUS
shipments fell 19.7% and 26.2% respectively.
France and Germany were hit by the same malaise that struck the
UK PC market in Q1, due in part to continued weakness in the
professional segment with some vendors experiencing a 20% drop in
desktop sales.
Netbooks or mini notebooks accounted for 20% of sales in the
mobile PCs space and the aggressive strategies of Acer and Samsung
drove sales higher than their rivals.
Atwal forecast a pessimistic outlook for the third quarter
suggesting it is likely to be “weaker than the second quarter as
year-on-year growth comparisons will include mini-notebooks.
“Back-to-school activity is in motion but needs to continue
throughout the third quarter to have any upswing effect on the
market,” he added.
The US and Asia Pacific declined 1.2% and 2.3% respectively and
the better than expected results can be interpreted as a small sign
of a PC market recovery in terms of shipment volumes in some
regions,” said Gartner principal analyst Mikako Kitagawa.