AMD notebook sales slip
Aggressive pricing by rival Intel dented chip maker's share of European market
AMD is losing its grip on the European notebook PC sector, according to figures from channel sales analyst Context.
Context claims that European channel sell-through figures for the first five months of 2004 show a "significant decline" in sales of AMD-powered notebook PCs. AMD's market share dropped to 10.7 per cent in May, compared with 16.7 per cent in January.
Intel Celeron-powered notebooks snatched 15 per cent of channel notebook PC sales in Europe's top seven economies, compared with 9.7 per cent in January, according to the analyst.
Jeremy Davies, senior partner at Context, said: "AMD launched an enormous push last year and many vendors were using its processors as entry-level platforms to get prices down. Intel responded by slashing the price of Celerons, particularly to local vendors using AMD."
Davies added that the battle between the two market leaders follows a pattern. "AMD finds a niche and exploits it, enjoying success for a while, and then Intel responds with an even better offer. Intel is huge compared with AMD," he said.
Gary Fowle, commercial director at Computer 2000, the UK arm of Tech Data, said he had not noticed a big drop in sales of AMD-powered notebooks.
"AMD has had a strong run in the past 12 months, with some real successes in the mobile market. This has slowed down, but it definitely isn't a slide," he said.
Fowle added that vendor loyalty is the real market driver. "Some vendors only produce AMD-powered machines and others are happy to sell both. We are doing well at the low end with AMD, but Intel is successful in the mid-market and higher end," he said.
AMD declined to comment at the time of going to press, because it is "unable to discuss market share issues".