Yet another horror quarter for PC manufacturers: Second quarter shipments crash 10.9%

The desktop PC market has suffered yet another horror quarter, with worldwide shipments slumping to 76 million units worldwide during the second quarter of 2013, 10.9% down from 85.3 million year-on-year, according to new Gartner figures.

The figures represent the fifth consecutive quarter of year-on-year declines in the troubled sector, coming on top of the 13.9% year-on-year decline shown in IDC’s first quarter figures.

“We are seeing the PC market reduction directly tied to the shrinking installed base of PCs, as inexpensive tablets displace the low-end machines used primarily for consumption in mature and developed markets,” says Gartner principal analyst Mikako Kitagawa.

“In emerging markets, inexpensive tablets have become the first computing device for many people, who at best are deferring the purchase of a PC. This is also accounting for the collapse of the mini notebook market.”

The best performing company in the troubled sector was market leader Lenovo, which saw a slight decline in shipments of 0.6% to 12,677,265 units, causing its marketshare to grow from 14.9% to 16.7%.

Second-placed HP saw its shipments fall 4.8% from 13.03 million to 12.4 million, while Dell’s sales dropped 3.9% from 9.34 million to 8.98 million.

However, the biggest drop came at Acer, which saw its shipments drop a massive 35.3% from 9.7 million to just 6.3 million units, while Asus saw a 20.5% fall from 5.7 million units to 4.5 million.

Independent PC makers were not spared by the falls, with their sales crashing by 10.5% from 34 million units to 31 million.

The situation is likely to remain grim for the PC industry, with the worldwide annual decline in PC sales expected to reach 7.8% during 2013, according to a recent IDC forecast.

IDC predicts the industry can expect a further -4.7% decline in the third quarter of 2013 and -1.6% in the fourth quarter.

“The expectation for the second quarter was not all that high, showing only minor improvement from the first quarter. But the May results reflect deteriorating conditions rather than improvement and the market will probably fall short of projections,” said Loren Loverde, program vice president, worldwide PC trackers at IDC.

“We still expect an improvement in the second half of the year as more new products are launched and we get into the back-to-school and holiday seasons [in the US]. But the market will likely remain cautious about the second half of 2013.”

The first quarter declines were particularly large in Australia, with sales slumping 21% year-on-year in Australia during the first quarter of 2013.

The situation was similar across the Tasman, with PC makers in New Zealand experiencing a 27% slump.