LONDON, May 25 (BestGrowthStock) – Shipments of notebook computers
leapt 43 percent in the first quarter, their highest
year-on-year growth in eight years, driven by consumer demand
for netbooks, IT research firm Gartner said on Tuesday.
Average selling prices dropped 16 percent to $732 as many
consumers chose inexpensive netbooks — mini-notebooks with
pared-down features — over more sophisticated laptop computers.
Total notebook sales rose 21 percent to $36.1 billion.
Hewlett-Packard (HPQ.N: ) remained the top vendor, with 19.2
percent of the market, but number two Acer (2353.TW: ) narrowed
the gap, increasing shipments by 48 percent to secure an 18.5
percent share.
Taiwan’s Asustek (2357.TW: ), a pioneer of the netbook market
with its Eee PC, more than doubled its shipments to win 8.8
percent of the market, in fifth place behind Dell (DELL.O: ) at
number three and Toshiba (6502.T: ) at number four.
“Mini-notebook PCs were a big part of the bump in mobile PC
shipments in the first quarter of 2010, with shipments growing
71 percent,” principal Gartner analyst Mikako Kitagawa said.
“However, mini-notebooks’ share slowed in some regions as
consumers begin to understand the limitations of mini-notebooks,
especially in the face of aggressive price cuts of regular
notebooks,” she added in a statement.
Gartner said it had seen some increase in demand from the
professional market, which it expected to accelerate towards the
end of the year and into 2011 as companies started to resume
delayed purchases to replace ageing equipment.
(Reporting by Georgina Prodhan, editing by Will Waterman)
Notebook shipments leapt 43 percent in Q1 -Gartner
Commnets
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