Worldwide PC shipments totaled 80.3 million units in the third quarter of 2013, an 8.6 percent decline from the same period last year, according to preliminary results by Gartner, Inc. This marks the sixth consecutive quarter of declining worldwide shipments.
“The third quarter is often referred to as the ‘back-to-school’ quarter for PC sales, and sales this quarter dropped to their lowest volume since 2008,” said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner, in a statement. “Consumers’ shift from PCs to tablets for daily content consumption continued to decrease the installed base of PCs both in mature as well as in emerging markets. A greater availability of inexpensive Android tablets attracted first-time consumers in emerging markets, and as supplementary devices in mature markets.”
HP and Lenovo have been virtually neck and neck for the top global position in the PC market. Lenovo took the lead, as it did last quarter, but the upcoming holiday sales season will be a key battlefield for both companies. Lenovo accounted for 17.6 percent of global PC shipments in the third quarter, and HP had 17.1 percent of shipments, according to preliminary results (see Table 1).
Weakness in the Chinese market continued to affect Lenovo’s overall growth. However, strong growth in the Americas, as well as EMEA, offset the declining PC shipments for Lenovo in the Asia/Pacific market. HP recorded positive shipment growth in 3Q13 for the first time since 1Q12. With the exception of Latin America, HP’s growth exceeded the average growth across all regions.
Table 1: Preliminary Worldwide PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 3Q13 (Units)
Note: Data includes desk-based PCs and mobile PCs, including mini-notebooks but not media tablets such as the iPad. Source: Gartner (August 2013)
Dell’s PC shipments exceeded growth rate averages across all regions. Acer’s shipments declined 22.6 percent compared with a year ago, as a reduction in netbook shipments impacted overall PC shipment results. Acer has heavily sought opportunities in other device markets. Asus saw PC shipments decline 22.5 percent. Asus has clearly shifted its focus from PCs to tablets. Asus’ tablet shipments were nearly equal to its mobile PC shipments in 3Q13.
In the U.S. market, PC shipments totaled 16.1 million units in the third quarter of 2013, a 3.5 percent increase from the same period last year, registering the second consecutive quarter of shipment growth after six quarters of decline (see Table 2). Low inventory from the first half of 2013, and the introduction of new models with Intel’s Haswell and new form factors brought the sell-in shipment up compared with a year ago.
“The positive U.S. results could mean that seasonal strength and channel fill for new product launches in 3Q13 finally overcame the structural decline,” Ms. Kitagawa said. “Even though 3Q13 shipments were compared with artificially weak 2Q13 because of inventory control for the Windows 8 launch at the time, the 3Q13 results imply the U.S. market may have passed the worst declining stage, which started in 2010. The shrinking installed base of PCs has also passed the steepest decline phase because the structural change has progressed fairly quickly. Tablets will continue to impact the PC market, but the U.S. PC market will see a more moderate decrease rather than a steep decline in the next two years.”
Table 2: Preliminary U.S. PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 3Q13 (Units)
Note: Data includes desk-based PCs and mobile PCs, including mini-notebooks but not media tablets such as the iPad. Source: Gartner (October 2013)
PC shipments in EMEA totaled 22.4 million units in the third quarter of 2013, a 13.7 percent decline from the same period last year. The EMEA region suffered its sixth consecutive quarter of declining PC shipments. All areas of the region — Western Europe, Eastern Europe and the Middle East and Africa — showed a shipment decline. PC shipments across all of Eastern Europe remained weak due to the ongoing popularity of tablets and some weakening of the Russian Ruble versus the euro and U.S. dollar, which led to a PC price increase.
In Asia/Pacific, PC shipments were at 28.1 million units in the third quarter of 2013, an 11.2 percent decline from the third quarter of 2012. The region was hampered by the currency volatilities, especially in India and Indonesia, where currencies plunged to record lows. Vendors were also mindful of Windows 8.1, new models based on Intel’s Bay Trail that will start shipping the following quarter. Therefore, they were careful in managing inventory.
These results are preliminary. Final statistics will be available soon to clients of Gartner’s PC Quarterly Statistics Worldwide by Region program. This program offers a comprehensive and timely picture of the worldwide PC market, allowing product planning, distribution, marketing and sales organizations to keep abreast of key issues and their future implications around the globe. Additional research can be found on Gartner’s Computing Hardware section on Gartner’s website at http://www.gartner.com/it/products/research/asset_129157_2395.jsp.
Source: Gartner, Inc.
MacDailyNews Note: As always, these are estimates by Gartner. We’ll find out Apple’s real Mac numbers when the company reports fiscal Q413 results after market close on October 28th.
Related article:
IDC: Worldwide PC market contracted 7.6 percent in Q313, Apple Mac declines 11.2 percent in U.S. market share – October 9, 2013
64 bit iPad comin’ my way.
(if’n muh gubbamint check don’t bounce.)
They’re waiting for new MacBooks to come out. Same thing has happened in past with iPhones, iPads, etc. History repeats itself. Wait for next quarter before a trend is predicted.
Mac Pro early announcement could account for 50000 units easily. Wait til this quarter for pent up demand to let go.
Dream on. The trash can will be a miserable failure.
I too was waiting for the new Mac Pro, but the “form over function” design with no PCI Express expansion slots and no NVIDIA GPU is a total failure.
I hate these Gartner, Inc. reports. They are so, so off the times.
Not including tablets? I wonder who made them the boss on what is and what isn’t a Personal Computer?
Units shipped? I’m sick of seeing that tripe. How about digging into the stats and extrapolating what was sold thru at full margin. I suspect Apple is way, way out in front on that benchmark.
There reports are good for nothing except lining bird cages and puppy kennels.
The whole purpose of these reports are to make Apple look bad. Why should they spend all that extra time just to make Apple look good?
Who cares what they consider a personal computer? The price of a mid-level iPad is equal to the price of a Windows desktop so as long as the money is rolling in thanks to iPad sales, let the report leave the iPad out. They’re only fooling themselves and some lazy investors who can’t figure things out for themselves. Revenue is revenue no matter how they classify a product. When Apple breaks out the quarterly numbers they’ll either meet or beat revenue or they don’t.
Agreed. Mini notebooks are counted. iPads are not?
And really, isn’t the important part not how many units are forced into the channel but how many sell. And how profitable the platform is?
The corporate market remains hooked on desktop PCs which run proprietary software designed for Microsoft Windows. The expiry of Win95 support means laggards now have to move to a new platform, presumably Windows 8, which requires beefier hardware.
Apple play largely in the home user space which, as the figures show, continues to decline as home users replace desktops with tablets.
The quarterly figures reflect various market distortions which serve to conceal the underlying trends. The desktop cycle used to be 3 years, and sometimes 2 years, with equipment acquired on leasing finance which locked in the replacement cycle. This cycle is stretching, largely because the Windows platform development cycle and Intel’s processor cycle are no longer producing significant performance advantages and/or demands on the hardware. Also, after decades of development fuelled by the move from mainframe and minicomputer technology, corporations have largely implemented their core platforms and find no advantage in replacing them.
These underlying trends, accompanied by slow, or no, growth in worldwide markets continue to dampen demand for desktops in the corporate space.
Notebook demand continues to be fuelled by technology changes, especially in battery and displays. Apple have a sizeable chunk of this market even in the corporate space.
The bottom line is that these numbers are counting waves and ignoring the tide.
Win95 support ended long ago dude lol.
I do agree with you about the core platforms being built and not needing heavy upgrades every 24 months. Absolutely true.
The only reason we move to new windows releases these days at my work is when they EOL a version.
We still have some file servers running Windows 2003 enterprise. They run around the clock and there are no advantages to upgrading them with the simple job they perform.
Well, that’s it for Apple. I’d say a nice downgrade is in order.
/s
Douchebags with their shitty analyzing. Add iPads into the mix and try again.
Though, to play devil’s advocate, Apple has been extremely slow this year in releasing much. I’ve got money for all new stuff, if they’d just friggin’ release it.
Delete your first sentence and your post makes some sense. However, Apple’s self-cannibalization is hardly admirable. You’d think Apple would make some effort to update and sell MacBooks. Cook doesn’t expend hardly any effort to keep the Mac platform vibrant, so why should we be surprised that sales are flat?
If you drill down, PC shipments in the US actually INCREASED because channel was very depleted, refilled.
Apple with essentially flat mac sales probably didn’t have any such channel issues. Anyway looks like channel noise.
But–news flash– macs aren’t going to take over the world. They’re elegant trucks for those of us who need trucks. But cars have been invented for the masses.
Just so long as Apple keeps making the best trucks as well as the best cars….
Another reason why sales dipped is because tablets are cannibalising pc and mac sales..
People aren’t replacing laptops with a laptop or new Desktop what they are doing is replacing them with iPads/tablets.
My Mac Pro was replaced with an iPad for example.
You have got to be kidding. No tablet replaces a Mac, you merely stopped doing computing-intensive work.
What people seem to be be ignoring is that in an overall flat market, traditional PC makers are struggling to sell machines with that horrid Windows 8 — and Cook, his attention focused for the last few years predominantly on the iOS platform, has not taken advantage of the opportunity to sell more Macs. That is unforgivable. Apple should be making not just the tablets that consumers want, but also the Macs that business, consumers, & enterprises need.
Since neither Apple nor Microsoft are doing so (Apple with locked down computer configurations, overpriced RAM, and high initial purchase prices; MS with a horrid GUI and continuing security issues), it’s no surprise that computer users are hanging onto their old machines as long as they can.