PC shipments grow but business sector suffers

growth in PC shipments

The PC market in Western Europe has shown a slight decrease compared to figures from 2008 but, sequentially, shipments are on the rise, according to Gartner.

A total of 16.7 million units were shipped across the area, which was a small decrease of 0.3 per cent compared to the same period last year. However, shipments rose by 30 per cent from the second quarter of this year, showing a return to seasonal growth patterns.

The UK market was a close reflection of the overall figures, showing a slightly larger decrease of 2.4 per cent compared to last year but a sequential rise of 30 per cent since the second quarter.

Ranjit Atwal, a principal Gartner analyst said he still had concerns for the business sector though.

"The decline in the PC market in the UK has slowed down and the return to growth will be slow and a difficult process. While the consumer market continued to defy the economic environment, the business market was still very weak," he said in a statement.

The mobile market in the UK was growing, put down to an increase in consumers purchasing netbooks, with Acer and Samsung seeing great success in this area.

But Atwal said that the professional market will continue to be weak and will remain so into the first half of 2010.

He concluded: "The PC market in the UK was weaker than both Germany and France, and it is not expected to become stronger than those countries in the near future."

Jennifer Scott

Jennifer Scott is a former freelance journalist and currently political reporter for Sky News. She has a varied writing history, having started her career at Dennis Publishing, working in various roles across its business technology titles, including ITPro. Jennifer has specialised in a number of areas over the years and has produced a wealth of content for ITPro, focusing largely on data storage, networking, cloud computing, and telecommunications.

Most recently Jennifer has turned her skills to the political sphere and broadcast journalism, where she has worked for the BBC as a political reporter, before moving to Sky News.