Acer agony but Lenovo lives it up in Q1 PC market

Big three vendors all decline as Lenovo gets aggressive on price

The big three vendors all lost ground in Q1 2011 as the global PC market suffered its first annual shipment decline in a year and a half.

Gartner reports that 84.25 million PCs were shipped worldwide during 2011's opening three months, down 1.1 per cent on the corresponding period last year. EMEA shipments slumped 2.8 per cent to 26.12 million, the first time the region has suffered an annual decline since Q3 2009.

Western Europe was singled out as the weakest performing region, particularly on the consumer side, where discretionary spend was withheld or spent on other form factors, such as tablets.

HP returns to the number-one spot in the EMEA market, despite shipments declining 9.3 per cent year on year to five million. The vendor's market share was down 1.4 points to 19.2 per cent, just ahead of Acer, with 18.9.

The Taiwanese vendor was Q1's biggest loser, enduring a shipment decline of 11.1 per cent in EMEA, on top of a massive 24.9 per cent slump in the US. Worldwide, the picture looked similarly bleak, with Acer shipments down 12.2 per cent year on year, compared to 3.4 and 2.2 per cent declines for HP and Dell respectively.

Dell held onto third spot in EMEA in Q1, with units shipped falling 7.3 per cent to 2.32 million, giving the Texan firm an 8.9 per cent slice of the market. Asus, in fourth, posted a 10.8 per cent decline, with market share down three-fifths of a point to 7.5 per cent.

Lenovo completed the top five after emerging as the quarter's big winner. The Chinese PC maker was the only leading vendor to post an EMEA shipment increase, with volumes up 7.2 per cent to 1.3 million. Market share also jumped half a point annually to 5.1 per cent.

The picture looked even brighter on a global scale, with shipments up 16.6 per cent to 8.1 million and market share rising 1.5 points to 9.7 per cent. Gartner attributed Lenovo's success, in part, to an aggressive price assault.

Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner, said: "Weak demand for consumer PCs was the biggest inhibitor of growth [in Q1]. Low prices for consumer PCs, which had long stimulated growth, no longer attracted buyers. Instead, consumers turned their attention to media tablets and other consumer electronics.

"With the launch of the iPad 2 in February, more consumers either switched to buying an alternative device, or simply held back from buying PCs. We're investigating whether this trend is likely to have a long-term effect on the PC market."