Sales increases across Western Europe show PCs are a necessity not a luxury
PC shipments in Western Europe totalled 15.6 million units in the second quarter of 2010, a 19.6 percent increase on the same period in 2009, according to a new report from Gartner. According to Gartner research director Ranjit Atwal, “Western Europe showed continued growth in the second quarter, recovering from the slowdown seen in the first half of 2009. The PC market has so far defied the general economic downturn, but the real test will be in the second half of 2010, since we saw a stronger second half in 2009.”
Business machine sales were outperformed by the consumer market, with sales of notebooks and all-in-one desktop PCs leading the way. Gartner says this market has been affected by the economic conditions and unit price increases, with companies attempting to drive down costs as part of their recession planning.
While there are encouraging signs across Western Europe as a whole, the UK has been the weakest of the markets in Western Europe. “Given the UK market was also the weakest in the downturn, its recovery had been much more muted,” comments Atwal. “There is no doubt that the introduction of austerity measures in the UK has hindered any anticipated improvement in the underlying demand for PCs. We don’t expect this to change for the rest of 2010. As businesses and consumers come to terms with the potential impact of the government measures, caution is certainly the keyword across all IT markets and the PC market is currently no different.”
