Despite an overall drop in PC sales in the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region for the first quarter, the Middle East and Africa (MEA) regions performed above expectations, according to the IDC Quarterly PC Tracker.
PC shipments declined by 9.6% year-on-year in the first quarter, on shipments of 24.1 million units across the EMEA region.
The market decline is attributed to the considerable 17.5% contraction of Western European shipment levels, compared to the first quarter of 2010.
Growth in the emerging markets of Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa remained positive, albeit moderate, with 5.5% and 6.3% gains, respectively.
“The situation in the Middle East also had an impact on market behaviour this quarter, but the market proved more resilient than expected,” says the IDC.
Research director for hardware and systems Stefania Lorenz says: "Despite the political unrest in the Middle East and Africa region during the first months of the year, the PC market performed well above expectations, driven by demand in the consumer notebook space in addition to a few large deals that took place across the region.”
Portable PCs grew by 13.4% in the MEA PC market, while -3.5% growth was reported in the desktop segment.
Lack of demand
The growth in the emerging markets was, however, not enough to offset the 17.5% drop in Western European shipment levels.
"Continued softness in the consumer space remains the primary reason behind this quarter's shortfall across most countries in Western Europe,” says research manager in IDC's personal computing group, Eszter Morvay.
“The current momentum around media tablets, as well as smartphones, clearly continued to drive consumers' attention away from PCs, shifting spending to these hot new devices, while PC renewals are put on hold.
“However, this 'wait and see' attitude is temporary, as PCs remain a must-have and the primary computing platform in the home," says Morvay.
The commercial market, particularly the corporate space, held up better this quarter, driven by continued recovery in enterprise renewals in several countries. But challenging economic conditions continued to affect SME demand levels, prompting businesses to remain cautious with investments, according to the IDC.
Vendor highlights
HP remains the leader in the EMEA region, despite a decline of 8.4% in overall shipments. Acer continues to be affected by persisting inventory levels and slowing demand, resulting in year-over-year growth of -25.2% in shipment levels in the region.
Dell recorded a softer decline due to its larger share of commercial shipments and continued growth in the emerging markets.
Asus also recorded an 8.4% contraction in shipments, but remains in the number four position in the region. Samsung was the only one of the top five vendors to record positive growth, driven by continued expansion into the Central Europe, Middle East and Africa region.
Apple has reportedly continued to benefit from continued momentum around the iPad and Apple branding and regional expansion.
Continued disruption
Gartner has also recently reported a worldwide drop in PC sales by 1.1% for the first quarter. The dip was the first since the second quarter of 2009, when most of the world was still in the grip of economic turmoil.
"Although the first quarter is traditionally a slow one for PC sales, these shipment results indicate potential sluggishness, not just a normal seasonal slowdown," said Gartner in a statement.
The IDC does, however, predict the overall EMEA PC market will remain constrained in 2011. This is as a direct result of the consumer spending shift and cautious SME investments, but is expected to benefit from a more favourable year-on-year comparison in the second quarter.
Associate VP of IDC EMEA systems and infrastructure solutions Karine Paoli says media tablets will “undoubtedly continue to disrupt the EMEA PC market this year”. The momentum is not expected to slow down in the second half of 2011 as more products will come to market in the second quarter and sales will boom during the back-to-school and Christmas seasons.
“However, with more than 22 million media tablets expected to be sold in EMEA this year, and a net new market opportunity estimated of over 15 million devices, the industry will actually benefit from a higher combined market growth opportunity than in 2010."
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