Personal Computer (PC) shipments declined by 5.1 percent in Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) in the fourth quarter 2001 year on year, leading to an overall decline of 3.6 percent for the full year 2001, according to preliminary data released by independent research company International Data Corporation (IDC).
Corporate investments continued to be affected by a squeeze on budgets and cost-saving strategies, with many companies postponing non-essential hardware renewals until 2002, affecting both desktop and notebook sales. Demand from small and medium businesses however remained strong and helped limit volume erosion, driven by on-going renewals and fierce vendor competition.
Consumer desktop sales remained weak as expected, with only a marginal lift from Windows XP. Nevertheless, consumer confidence remained high, outlined by a strong demand for notebooks and multimedia digital products in the retail channel.
“With few vendors benefiting from end-of-year fiscal budgets as a result of cutbacks, the business notebook market continued to mark-out a sluggish dynamic,” explained Andy Brown, research manager for Mobile Computing at IDC.
The market shift towards notebooks, however, continued to take place, with strong consumer demand, driven by attractive product offerings, price declines and a continuous push in the retail channel, he added. The notebook market has become increasingly competitive and less oligopolistic, with new manufacturers entering the market, focusing specifically on the volume consumer marketplace.
A few Employee Purchase Programs and Affinity Deals also helped to generate some volume across the region. “Corporate investments are expected to pick up but cautious attitudes will continue to prevail, limiting the prospects of a major rebound in the first half of 2002,” said Karine Paoli, IDC’s EMEA personal computing expertise center manager.
”On the consumer side, and as outlined by our recent consumer end-user survey, the market will remain affected by the lack of compelling reason for upgrades, unless vendors manage to refine their marketing messages to stimulate renewals,” she added.
Continued consolidation in the PC market continued to be evident, with the top five vendors representing over 45 percent of total EMEA sales. However, local European vendors continued to be very active in the desktop market and made a clear push on the notebook market. AMD also continued to gain share over Intel, benefiting from a shift in market focus towards consumer and small and medium business.
Compaq retained clear leadership of the overall PC market in EMEA and took the first position in the EMEA notebook market for both fourth quarter and Full Year 2001, outpacing Toshiba. The vendor also benefited from a simplified product line and a strong internal sales focus despite the potential acquisition by HP.
Dell continued to outperform the market, with strong double-digit growth driven by the continued expansion of the direct leader into the SMB market. Dell consolidated its number two position and shipped in excess of one million units in a quarter for the first time.
Fujitsu-Siemens showed a healthy recovery driven by sustained results in the SMB and consumer markets in Germany as well as a strong mobile computing focus leading to strong double-digit notebook sales.
Hewlett Packard marked-out a sustained performance, driven by robust SMB sales, as well as continued gains on both the notebook and consumer markets, which enabled the vendor to take the third place in the overall rankings for the full year 2001.
A softer performance from IBM was the result of a strong Q4 2000, where shipments were inflated by large affinity deals. IBM’s Top Seller program, however, proved very successful and enabled the vendor to drive very competitive performance in the SMB marketplace. — (menareport.com)
© 2002 Mena Report (www.menareport.com)
