The dollar volume growth from Windows and Office represented about 80 percent of the volume growth for the entire PC software retail market, an analyst says.
The non-games software market in the United
States reported its best performance since
1999 last year, in large part due to the release of Windows Vista and Office
2007, and in smaller part due to releases from Apple and Adobe.
U.S.
software sales rose 15 percent in 2007 to $3.3 billion from sales of $2.9
billion in 2006, spurred by what consumer and retail information company NPD
Group described in a report as a "perfect storm" of new product
releases.
This spike in sales growth comes after a period of relative flatness for the
non-games market between 2000 and the end of 2006, where there was a compound
annual growth rate of about 2 percent, Chris Swenson, director of software
industry analysis at NPD, told eWEEK.
Also, as previously reported by eWEEK, Microsoft Office led the pack
with year-over-year growth of 50 percent, accounting for 17 percent of all
dollar volume in the U.S.
retail PC software market.
"The combined year-over-year dollar volume growth from Windows and
Office is roughly 80 percent of the volume growth for the entire PC software retail
market over the year," Swenson said.
As such, operating system software led the charge, rising 58 percent in
dollar terms year over year, he said, noting that Windows Vista was a large
contributor to these gains.
In fact, a Microsoft-sponsored NPD study, which is currently underway, asked
a sample of people who had bought a Vista PC in 2007 if they were satisfied with the
operating system. "The vast majority said yes, with 70 percent being
either satisfied or very satisfied," Swenson said.
But the findings also indicate that Microsoft really has to work with
software companies and peripheral manufacturers to make sure third-party
applications and devices work seamlessly with Vista, he
said.
"I'm sure Vista SP1 will take care of much of this. But the
notion that few U.S.
consumers are happy with the Vista experience is just
not supported by the evidence," Swenson said.
Despite these numbers, Vista has had a slow start
with businesses, many of which have decided to wait until after Vista Service
Pack 1 is released later this quarter before considering an upgrade to the
latest edition of Windows.
Has Microsoft disavowed Vista? Click here to read more.
With regard to other software sales, business software was up 41 percent in
dollar terms year over year, while finance software gained 13 percent.
Imaging and graphics software rose 10 percent over 2006 on the back of the
release of Adobe's Creative Suite, along with all of the leading tools in its
suite of products. This new version sold some 80 percent more units than the
previous one over the same period of time, Swenson said.
While security software posted a 16 percent sales rise in dollar terms over
the year, sales of security suite software rocketed 55 percent, with Symantec,
McAfee, Trend Micro and Microsoft all experiencing year-over-year dollar volume
gains in 2007. "The main driver is the move away from individual point
tools towards integrated solution," he said.
Tax software publishers Intuit and H&R Block also had a banner year
after working to make their premium products more attractive to users in 2007,
and eliminating rebates and state tax SKUs, which caused year-over-year retail
tax software sales to drop in 2006, Swenson said.
Not all sectors posted increases, however, with personal productivity
software seeing a year-over-year 18 percent decline in dollar terms, and
educational software falling 17 percent over the same time period.
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