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For Hewlett-Packard, its lonely at the top.
Once again, the Palo Alto, Calif., company ranked first in worldwide PC shipments, beating out Dell to control nearly 20 percent of the market, according to reports released July 18 by IDC and Gartner.
The Gartner report found that HP controlled about 18 percent of all worldwide PC shipments in the second quarter of 2007, an increase of 36 percent from last year. The IDC study found HP controlled 19 percent of the market, also an increase of 36 percent.
Despite an effort since January to revamp its lineup, including adding Linux and SSD (solid state drive) options to some of desktops and notebooks, as well as reaching out to retail outlets such as Wal-Mart, Dells share of the market slipped about 5 percent, according to the two reports. For the second quarter of 2007, Dell owned between 15 and 16 percent of all PC shipments in the world, according to Gartner and IDC.
Overall, worldwide PC shipments increased in the second quarter of this year. IDC found that shipments increased more than 12 percent, while Gartner found shipments increased 11.7 percent, for a total of 61.1 million PCs.
Once again, the consumer side drove the market, with buyers looking for “mobility, connectivity and price” in their PCs, said Charles Smulders, an analyst with Gartner. Microsofts Windows Vista operating systems had little or no impact on shipments, Smulders added.
Although HPs dominance of the PC market continued, the two reports, which track PC shipments in the United States and worldwide, found that several of the smaller vendors, specifically Acer and Toshiba, made significant strides.
“The success of HP and Acer as well as the rapid changes occurring at Dell in recent quarters underline just how dynamic the PC market is these days,” Loren Loverde, an analyst with IDC, wrote in one report. “Despite the temptation to simplify, the market is not just about replacing systems at the lowest cost. System design, customer service, channel coverage, and market expansion are all playing key roles in winning business.”
In the U.S. market, Gateway, Apple, Toshiba and Acer each own about 5 percent of all PC shipments, according to the IDC report. While Gateway lost about 7 percent of its market share between the second quarter of 2006 and the second quarter of 2007, Apple increased its shipments by 26 percent, Toshiba by 50 percent and Acer by more than 163 percent.
The Gartner report found a similar result, with Toshiba gaining 54 percent from 2006 and Acer increasing its shipments by more than 163 percent.
In both the U.S. and worldwide markets, Acer has been taking share away from Dell and HP by appealing to consumers and small businesses with PCs at a good price.
“They are much more focused on marketing than technology, but their model is a threat to all the other vendors in the PC market,” Smulders said.
HP and Dell still remain the two dominant players in the U.S. PC market. For the second quarter, Dell remained the top vendor with 28.4 percent of the market, but it lost nearly 11 percent of its share compared with the same time last year. HP remained second with 23.6 percent of U.S. PC shipments and gained 26 percent share compared with 2006, according to IDC.
Gartner painted a similar picture, with Dell accounting for nearly 30 percent of U.S. shipments, but also showing an 11 percent loss from 2006. HP remained in second place with 25 percent market share, gaining 25 percent year over year. Gateway, Acer and Toshiba rounded out the top five.
“I think there was a big fundamental change in the market,” said Smulders, referring to Dells declining fortunes and HPs increasing market share. “There was a very rapid decline in pricing and a strong move to mobile PCs and a shift toward non-U.S. markets. This all conspired to unseat the direct model that Dell used.”
In the worldwide market, both IDC and Gartner placed Lenovo third with about an 8 percent market share, an increase of approximately 22 percent from the second quarter of 2006.
Acer and Toshiba rounded out the top five in terms of worldwide shipments. Acer held a 7 percent market share, an increase of about 55 percent from 2006. Toshiba accounted for about 4 percent of all worldwide PC shipments, but its share increased more than 20 percent, according to both IDC and Gartner.