Gartner: UK PC market on ever-declining trend

More bad news for the ailing client space as B2B and consumer sectors both hurting in Q3

The UK PC market "is now on an ever-declining trend", Gartner has claimed, after yet another quarter of sizeable shipment shrinkage.

During 2012's third quarter unit shipments in this country dropped 7.2 per cent year on year to just under three million. Both the consumer and B2B markets suffered a setback, falling by eight and six per cent respectively. The desktop and notebook sectors also both posted declines, the former of three per cent and the latter of 13 per cent.

Top vendor HP stretched its lead at the top as its quarterly UK shipments fell a comparatively modest 2.8 per cent to 551,000. Dell and Acer, in second and third respectively, endured declines of 22.6 and 17.3 per cent, allowing HP's lead to almost double compared with the corresponding period last year. The top three now have market shares of 18.5, 11.8 and 9.3 per cent.

Toshiba, in fourth, was the quarter's big winner, as its shipments increased by more than a quarter to 266,000, just 11,000 behind Acer. The Japanese giant has swapped places with fifth-placed Apple in the last year as its market share has gone from 6.5 to 8.9 per cent.

The Mac maker, meanwhile, also saw its share grow year on year in Q3 from 7.1 to 7.9 per cent, as shipments rose by 2.4 per cent. All other vendors, which account for 43.7 per cent of the market, saw shipments decline 12.8 per cent to 1.3 million.

Gartner research director Ranjit Atwal said: "The PC market has not only lost its lustre but is now on an ever-declining trend. The challenge to get users to buy the next generation of PCs with Windows 8 is huge.

"There is no doubt that the recent launch of Windows 8 has had an impact on inventory levels. However, the question is whether the vendors can position and price the products correctly during the next quarter."

The UK's performance in Q3 compares rather favourably with the rest of western Europe, with PC shipments across the entire region falling 15.4 per cent annually to 13.6 million during the quarter.

The French market contracted 7.6 per cent to 2.6 million shipments, while in Germany growth was hit by a flushing out of channel inventory ahead of the Windows 8 launch as shipments fell 19 per cent to 2.7 million.