Huawei takes fight to Dell, HP and Lenovo with PC launch
Chinese vendor looks to emulate recent success in smartphone and tablet markets
Chinese vendor Huawei has announced plans to launch into the stagnant PC market and challenge the established order of HP, Dell and Lenovo.
At a news conference in Berlin yesterday, Huawei announced plans to release three PC models to the consumer market.
The worldwide PC market has been declining over recent years, leading giants like Toshiba and Sony to leave the space, and Fujitsu to look to offload its PC division to Lenovo.
Huawei will now launch its PC range in 12 countries globally next month, Reuters reports.
"From Huawei's perspective, we see opportunities in the PC market's decline," Huawei's senior PC marketing manager Cheng Lei told Reuters.
"Our investment in the PC industry is not short-term. We will have a long-term investment, not only in marketing but in R&D."
Huawei has already seen success in the endpoint device space over recent years, with its smartphones and tablets consistently gaining ground on the market leaders in both industries.
Research published by IDC earlier this month showed Huawei to be the only vendor to experience growth in tablet shipments in Q1 of 2017.
Market leader Apple saw shipments decline 13 per cent year on year and second placed Samsung was down 1.1 per cent, but Huawei saw growth of 31.7 per cent.
Alex Tatham, managing director of distributor Westcoast, said that Huawei's entrance to the market is indicative of a relative revival for the PC market.
"Over the past two years most people have said the PC market is dead, it's doomed and it's not the format that everyone wants anymore," he said. "But if there is a new entrant to the marketplace then it must be that there is a market for them. I think it's a vote of confident for all PC manufacturers.
"If you look at the middle vendors however, such as Acer and Asus, they feel a bit squeezed as a business, but the smaller vendors like MSI and Gigabyte are very focused on what they're trying to achieve and the differentiators that their brand brings as opposed to Dell and HP.
"Huawei have to be careful not to be in the squeezed middle and focus on the things they want to try and make better. They're such an innovative company with their telephony and connectivity that there may be some things they can bring to the marketplace that we don't even understand or know about yet."
From a channel perspective, Tatham warned that Huawei might have to make itself more accessible if it is to see early success in its PC venture.
"Their channel policy is sometimes a little confused and their ability to partner I've found sometimes to be harder than it should be, but nevertheless I'm sure that they will partner when it comes to PCs, depending on what their plans are, and I would absolutely engage with any new entrants. I think it's very interesting."
James Hardy, deputy managing director at VAR CCS Media, said that Huawei might not necessarily replicate the success it has had with lower-priced devices in the smartphone and tablet markets in the UK, because of changing customer habits.
He explained that, while Huawei has seen strong growth globally in these industries, its success has been driven in emerging markets that are far less mature than the UK.
"Worldwide absolutely [they'll see success], and in emerging economies absolutely, but when you look at the research you have to look at the UK and maybe France and Germany - very mature IT economies," he said. "The U.K. market is well served by the likes of HP, Dell, Lenovo and Microsoft.
"Over the last four-to-five years we've seen an increase in the value that devices can have for end-users, and the investment that those manufacturers have made in R&D has seen a transition away from very low priced, sub-£500 devices for end-users. That's in line with a change in how users work in the UK - in businesses especially."