PC sales continue to tank - down globally again in the fourth quarter

Gartner box-counters see sales fall by eight per cent in 2015

Worldwide PC shipments have fallen again, down by 8.3 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2015, according to analysts at Gartner.

For the year, PC shipments totalled 288.7 million units, down by eight per cent on 2014 as the mid-year release of Windows failed to instigate a turnaround in PC sales.

According to Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner, this is the fifth consecutive quarterly fall in global PC shipments, which have generally been moribund for around eight years. All regions registered a decrease in shipments, according to Kitagawa, with currency devaluation affecting sales in Europe, Latin America and Japan in particular.

Windows 10, meanwhile, failed to spark a PC-buying frenzy, she added.

"Holiday sales did not boost the overall PC shipments, hinting at changes to consumers' PC purchase behaviour. On the business side, Windows 10 generally received positive reviews, but as expected, Windows 10 migration was minor in the fourth quarter as many organisations were just starting their testing period," said Kitagawa.

Gartner is forecasting a more modest decline in 2016 of one per cent compared to 2015, but suggests that there is the potential for a "soft recovery" in late 2016. Kitagawa claims that the PC market is in the middle of structural change, which will reduce the PC installed base over the next few years as people use smartphones and tablets for more and more applications that might, in the past, have required a PC.

Worldwide, Lenovo is the biggest PC vendor with 20.3 per cent of the market in the fourth quarter, followed by HP with 18.8 per cent and Dell - once the market leader - down in third with a share of 13.5 per cent. Asus, Apple and Acer follow with market shares of 7.9 per cent, 7.5 per cent and 7 per cent respectively.

Vendors across the board saw declines in unit sales, but the "others" were affected particularly badly as independents saw their sales fall by 16.3 per cent overall.

Of course, the PC upgrade cycle for both home and business has clearly stretched, while many people find mobile devices, such as smartphones sufficient for their needs.

Independent PC sellers have responded to the tougher conditions by offering PCs more closely aligned with particular applications. Both Mesh and Novatech, for example, now offer PCs specifically for CAD applications, video editing, trading and even flight simulation. However, the long-term trend remains in the direction of ever-greater consolidation towards a few PC majors.