According to the latest data of the market research institute Gartner, 68.4 million PCs were delivered worldwide in the second quarter of 2015. This represents a decrease of 9.5% compared with the same quarter of the previous year. Analysts forecast a 4.4% reduction in sales for the full year of 2015.
The outlook for 2016 is nevertheless positive. Gartner expects slow and steady growth to return. This is due to the specific factors that have led to the current collapse because it concerns three unprecedented effects.
First, there is the strong appreciation of the US dollar against a number of other currencies, which is believed to have dampened demand considerably. Second, the PC market saw a strong but only short-term sales boost in 2014 due to the end of support for Windows XP. Many users scrapped their old XP computer and switched to newer models. Third, many retailers cleared out their stocks in the third quarter due to the launch of Windows 10 in order to make room for PCs equipped with the new operating system.
In the second quarter of 2015, the world’s leading PC manufacturer was Lenovo with a market share of 19.7%. It was followed by HP with 17.4%, Dell with 14.0%, Asus with 6.8% and Acer with 6.7%. (Source: Gartner/rf)