Worldwide PC sales grew by about 17% in the second quarter of the year as falling prices spiked demand in Asia and Latin America, research firm IDC said on Tuesday.
Total PC shipments during the second quarter grew to 46,57-million compared with 39,94-million in the same period a year earlier, IDC said.
The sales growth of 16,6% was far higher than the 12,3% growth predicted by IDC.
Dell Corporation was identified as the world’s largest supplier, with a market share that has climbed to more than 19%.
Much of the rise came from strong demand for laptop computers and falling prices for desktop units which were attractive both to new users and companies updating their old computers.
”Competition is decreasing prices across all platforms to the point where we’re seeing record low prices on the desktop side and continuing decreasing prices on the laptop side,” said David Daoud, an IDC research manager.
Rival research firm Gartner, which uses a different methodology for calculating sales, estimated overall growth at 14,8% with 48,9-million computer sales, up from 42,6-million a year ago.
Gartner said PC shipments grew 17% in Asia, 25% in Latin America and almost 19% in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
IDC said the 16,6% gain compared with the same quarter a year ago was the fastest growth rate since PC shipments posted an 18,9% year-over-year increase in the third quarter of 2000.
”This kind of growth in the PC market is just amazing,” said Loren Loverde, director of IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker.
”At some point, we expect the flood of consumer and portable demand to let up, but so far falling prices and demand across regions and market segments continues to support growth.”
The two research firms identified Dell as the world’s top computer seller with a 19,3% market share, up from 18,2% in the same period last year. Rival HP was in second spot as its market share remained stable at 15,6%.
Lenovo, which merged with IBM in the second quarter, was the number three PC maker, with a 7,6% market share, followed by Acer with 4,4% and Fujitsu/Siemens with 3,7%. – Sapa-DPA