Toshiba faces desktop doldrums in UK market

Japanese manufacturer will not revise UK PC sales forecasts despite slower than expected take-up

Toshiba UK has conceded that sales of its desktop range are lower than expected, three months after the manufacturer entered the PC market for the first time.

Andrew Didcott, desktop sales manager at Toshiba UK, admitted that ?sales were going great, but not as good as we had thought?. He had, however, acknowledged before the launch that ?a roll-out of thousands of units would take a number of years?.

Didcott confirmed that UK forecasts had not been revised as a result of the depressed sales.

He also said the manufacturer was encouraged by good early wins within the corporate and SME sectors.

Martin Clarke, sales and marketing director at Lapland UK, said that although figures were not available as yet, the Toshiba machines have been selling very well, adding: ?It has been very encouraging for us.?

But Clarke conceded that despite steady sales, he appreciated that it would take time for Toshiba to win significant market share.

Brian Green, PC business manager at Interface Systems International, said the distributor had experienced increased interest in Toshiba?s Equium PC range in August. ?Instead of ones and twos, we?ve been having requests for hundreds of units,? he said.

Meanwhile, Toshiba has scaled down its forecast for the shipment of personal computers to the global market in fiscal year 1997/98 because of lower than expected sales on the domestic markets in the US and Japan.

The projected figures have now been revised from four million units to 3.7 million units, and corresponding sales from Y1.1 trillion to Y1 trillion respectively. Toshiba does not yet sell desktops within the UK domestic market.