PC Sales Flounder But Numbers Don’t Tell the Whole Story
By: Tech Believes
In a curious sign of our times, worldwide PC sales are predicted to hit a major slump in 2009. The news, dished out by iSuppli hit the computer manufacturing industry, with its web of subindustries, like the actual news of a long-expected death.
The news was particularly hard for the PC industry, since this is the first time it has sunk for over eight years. Mammoth corporations HP and Dell are coping with the downturn my beefing up other sectors of their business, but the decline is still a big ouch.
iSupli’s senior analyst Matthew Wilkins reported that “an annual decline in unit shipments is highly unusual in the PC market. Even in weak years PC unit shipments typically rise by single-digit percentages.”
2009 got off to a rough start, specifically in the desktop sector. In the first quarter, computer manufacturers were distributing a quarter less computers than they were before.
But the sad news is only part of the story. There is good news, too.
First, laptop sales are better than ever. The notebook industry watched a soaring increase in shipments, a jump of nearly 12 percent. For the first time in the brief history of computers, laptops are selling more than desktops.
Another bit of good news that puts the bad news into perspective is the rabid spread of the netbook. With its unassuming genesis into the alternative laptop market, it slowly grew into a massive market force. Although it is a trimmed-down version of the notebook PC, it still gives users the ability to do what they always did on their PC anyway: surf the web. But the price drop from their notebook cousins was what lured most recession-fearing consumers into making the purchase. Now, netbooks pack enough punch to make them near-equals in terms of power. The dire expectation of a slowing PC market does not take into account the happy news of consumers thirsty for small (and cheap) machines, fueling the mushrooming market of the netbook.
And there is another reason. The world is going mobile. The ‘curious sign of our times’ is not that the economy is failing. The ‘curious sign of our times’ is that the world is going mobile. Lighter, faster, and more powerful smartphones have washed into the tech market like a tsunami. Even big PC makers are jumping onto the wave in order to capitalize on consumer’s who crave the pocket power of an iPhone or Blackberry. These tricked-out devices may never entirely replace a desktop, but they could slow down the purchase of one for a while.
So, with all due condolences to a sliding PC market, there is good news in the market, too.