Remote working and distance learning amid the coronavirus outbreak continue increasing global demand for PCs and laptops.
After a sharp fall in the first quarter of 2020, global PC shipments have grown in the last six months, despite the effects of the Covid-19 crisis.
According to data presented by StockApps.com, Lenovo, HP, and Dell, as the world’s three largest PC manufacturers, shipped 121,5-million units in the nine months of 2020. With 47,1-million shipments in this period, Lenovo tops the global PC vendor ranking.
The rise in smartphone usage and the global shift from hardware to cloud solutions had been driving a downturn in global PC shipment for seven years in a row. In 2011, 365,3-million units were shipped worldwide, revealed the Gartner data. By the end of 2017, this figure dropped by almost 30% to 262,7-million.
The 2018 shortage in Intel central processing units brought a new hit for merchants’ supply chains and cut global shipments to 259,7-million that year, under 2007 levels.
In 2019, 261,2-million PCs were shipped worldwide, which was a slight increase from 2018 figures. However, the Covid-19 outbreak triggered the biggest fall in shipment since 2013, as pandemic affected supply chains.
The Gartner data showed 51,6-million PC units were shipped in the first quarter of 2020, down 12,3% from the previous year. Between April and June, the market started showing signs of recovery, with global PC shipment rising by 2,8% YoY to 64,8-million.
Consumer demand for PCs due to remote working, home entertainment, and distance learning amid an ongoing pandemic, along with the strongest US PC market growth in a decade, drove the global market momentum in the third quarter of the year. Between July and September, 71,4-million PCs were shipped worldwide, a 3,6% jump year-over-year.
Statistics show that 187,8-million PCs were shipped worldwide in the nine months of 2020, a 1,6% drop YoY.
The Gartner data also revealed that Lenovo, as the market leader, increased its market share in 2020, despite the Covid-19 pandemic. In the fourth quarter of 2019, the Chinese tech giant had a 24,8% market share, with 17,5-million shipments worldwide.
In the third quarter of 2020, the number of shipped units jumped by 8,3% YoY to 18,3-million, while its market share rose to 25,7%.
As the second-largest PC vendor globally, HP hit a 21,6% market share in the third quarter of 2020, down from 22,8% in December last year.
The Gartner data indicate that Dell’s market share, as the third-largest PC vendor globally, dropped from 17,2% in Q4 2019 to 15,2% in Q3 2020. The US computer technology company also witnessed the most significant drop in PC shipments among the top three vendors, with the figure falling from 12,1-million in December to 10,8-million in September.