14 DAY TRIAL // After some months that saw problems in various branches of the computer manufacturing industry encounter supply or very low market prices that drove hardware component shipments to very low levels, the market research firm IDC predicts that the current market trend and increasing demand for customers will drive the entire computer industry to increase its shipments. Worldwide computer shipments are expected to reach a total of 257.5 million units at the end of the year, which would mean a rise of 12.6 percent over the previous estimates.
According to the news site serverbulletin, the current market trend reflects a 28 percent year on year growth in the portable computing market segment, while the desktop and server segments are affected by a slight decrease that was predicted as the laptop and notebook computer systems are getting cheaper while offering increasing level of performance.
This new market trend update calculated by IDC shows only the slightest increase over the June 2007 forecasts when it comes to the compound annual growth rate for the 2006 to 2011 time frame. The force behind this market growth is the Asian region, excluding Japan, where the growing market trend was not limited solely to the mobile computing market but it affected the desktop and commercial segments as well.
In sharp contrast with most of the Asian computer market, the rest of the world, including Japan, the United States and the western half of Europe, is lowering the expected growth rate figure for the remaining months of this year. While the growth rate of the computer markets from the developed countries is slowing down, the rate of adoption of new computer systems in the emerging economies is fast growing.
"Overall, we should expect to see strong growth for the next several years, with double-digit increases expected through 2009," said Loren Loverde, director of IDC's Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker. "The shift to mobility will continue to drive growth, as portable PCs are expected to represent more than 50% of shipment value during 2007 and more than half of worldwide volume by 2009. Portable share of PC Clients will reach 68% of volume in the United States and Western Europe by 2011, 44% in APeJ and Rest of World, and 55% overall."
In the United States, the current state of affairs on the computer market aimed at the general public is quite murky, so there are no wild growth rates to expect there as most hardware manufacturing companies like Dell and HP are going through a restructuring process. At the same time, expansionist moves from Asian companies like Lenovo and Acer will keep the market very competitive and dynamic, a fact that will most likely strongly affect smaller hardware producers, while keeping a measure of pressure on the big native companies as well.