Global PC Shipments Drop 0.2% in 2014 to 315.9 M. Units: Gartner

Worldwide personal computer (PC) shipments totaled 83.7 million units in Q4, 2014, a 1 percent  increase from the same period of 2013, or year-on-year (YoY), to show a slow but consistent improvement following more than two years of decline, according to Gartner Inc.

"The PC market is quietly stabilizing after the installed base reduction driven by users diversifying their device portfolios. Installed base PC displacement by tablets peaked in 2013 and the first half of 2014. Now that tablets have mostly penetrated some key markets, consumer spending is slowly shifting back to PCs," said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner.

According to Gartner's statistics, 2014 global PC shipments totaled about 315.87 million units, down 0.2 percent from the previous year's 316.47 million.

In 2014, two Taiwanese PC vendors, Acer and ASUS, maintained their global rankings of No. 4 and No.5, respectively. The former shipped 24.91 million PCs in 2014 (25.31 million shipped in 2013), down 1.6 percent from the previous year, for market share of 7.9 percent (8.0 percent in 2013). ASUS delivered 22.84 million units (20.85 million units in 2013), up 9.5 percent YoY, for  market share of 7.2 percent (6.6 percent in 2013).

Q4Again Lenovo held its position as the worldwide leader in PC shipments in Q4, 2014, with 19.4 percent of the market. Lenovo showed mixed results in the quarter with strong growth in Europe, Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) region and the U.S., but shipments declined in Latin America and Japan. The share difference between Lenovo and HP narrowed in Q4, 2014 with HP growing 16 percent and garnering 18.8 percent of the market. HP has expressed its commitment to the device market, and has started to show  positive result with strong growth in the U.S. HP's growth in EMEA and Asia/Pacific also exceeded the regional average.

Dell continued as No. 3 and accounted for 12.7 percent of the market. The Q4, 2014 results indicate that Dell's expansion into the consumer market has been successful, which was the least focused market for the company prior to the leveraged buyout.

“The fourth quarter of 2014 was the best holiday for PC sales in recent history. The primary driver was mobile PCs including regular notebooks, thin and light notebooks and 2-1s. Low priced notebooks with about a US$300-200 price point boosted shipments while thin/light notebooks and two-in-ones (laptops with a detachable or bendable screen) showed strong growth. These results supports our assumption that consumer spending is returning to the PC as tablet penetration has reached the majority of the market,” said Kitagawa.

“However, consumers continue to be attracted to smartphones, especially in emerging markets such as China and India where it is increasingly difficult for PC vendors to convince consumers to put priority on PC purchases,” said Ms. Kitagawa. “Users here are more focused on content consumption or on specific tasks where functions can be handled by a smartphone. Coupled with limited disposable income, these buyers are delaying PC purchases if they do not see the need, therefore making the consumer market more lackluster than what it used to be.”

Preliminary Global PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 2014 (1,000 units)
Company	2014 Shipments	2014 Market Share (%)	2013 Shipments	2013 Market Share (%)	2014-2013 Growth (%)
Lenovo	59,446.6	18.8	53,493.6	16.9	11.1
HP	55,286.8	17.5	51,251.0	16.2	7.9
Dell	40,487.3	12.8	36,825.0	11.6	9.9
Acer Group	24,914.0	7.9	25,309.2	8.0	-1.6
Asus	22,841.6	7.2	20,852.5	6.6	9.5
Others	112,890.1	35.7	128,733.5	40.7	-12.3
Grand Total	315,866.3	100.0	316,464.7	100.0	-0.2
Notes: Data includes desk-based PCs, notebook PCs, premium ultramobiles and all Windows-based tablets. It excludes Chromebooks and other non-Windows-based tablets. All data is estimated based on a preliminary study. Final estimates will be subject to change. Source: Gartner (January 2015)