Lenovo tops PC makers

Lenovo Group held on to its position as the world’s No. 1 personal computer maker in the latest quarter despite a drastic dip in its core Chinese market, according to figures published by tech research firm Gartner on Wednesday.

Overall, the latest numbers showed an 8.6 percent decline in PC sales in the third quarter, confirming a worldwide trend towards tablets that has benefited Apple Inc and Google Inc but hurt traditional PC stalwarts Microsoft Corp and Intel Corp.

Worldwide PC shipments totaled 80.3 million in the latest three month period, the lowest level since 2008, Gartner said, despite the ‘back to school’ season when sales traditionally spike.

Europe, Middle East and Africa was the worst hit region, with a 13.7 percent decline in PC sales, followed by Asia Pacific with an 11.2 percent decline. The U.S. market increased 3.5 percent, helped by low inventories being re-stocked and the popularity of models featuring the latest Intel chips, Gartner said.

“Consumers’ shift from PCs to tablets for daily content consumption continued to decrease the installed base of PCs both in mature as well as in emerging markets,” said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner. “A greater availability of inexpensive Android tablets attracted first-time consumers in emerging markets, and as supplementary devices in mature markets.”

Strong sales in the United States and Europe helped Chinese PC maker Lenovo hold onto the top spot among manufacturers, offsetting the decline in Asia.

Lenovo’s overall shipments rose 2.8 percent over a year ago to give the company a 17.6 percent share of the global market.

Former No. 1 Hewlett-Packard Co, which is being remodeled by Chief Executive Meg Whitman, posted a 1.5 percent growth in shipments for a 17.1 percent global market share. It was H-P’s first positive shipment growth figure since the first quarter of 2012. Whitman said on Wednesday that she expected to stabilize revenues next year as she continues her work to reverse the company’s fortunes.

source: interaksyon.com

Lenovo bends over backwards in bid to claim top PC spot with ‘Yoga’

MANILA, Philippines — Lenovo is proving to be a strong contender willing to do everything to gain the coveted top spot in the PC market as it headlines its efforts with the local release of the IdeaPad Yoga, a 13-inch ultrabook that bends over backwards – literally — to become a tablet.

Lenovo Philippines Country Manager Vicky Agorrilla said the IdeaPad Yoga will be the company’s ticket to finally and officially claiming the number one spot in global PC sales, stealing the throne from erstwhile market leader Hewlett-Packard.

“Our claim to being number one is marked by 12 consecutive quarters of growth in an industry that has, for the last quarter, fallen by about 8 percent,” Agorrilla told the local technology press during the launch of the IdeaPad Yoga in the Philippines.

In October, research firm Gartner already declared China’s Lenovo as the number one vendor of PCs in the world with 15.7 percent market share from shipping an estimated 13.77 million units globally during the third quarter of the year, beating, HP’s 15.5 percent share.

Rival research house IDC has yet to award the top spot to Lenovo, but in the same quarter noted that the company is just 0.2 percentage points away from the US’s HP.

Agorrilla admitted that the overall PC industry outlook has been quite dim in the past year, overshadowed by newer devices such as smartphones and tablets as exasperated consumers quit holding off for the coming of Windows 8.

“We all know there’s a temporary slowdown in the market, but we also know that the PC is revolutionizing, and it is turning into many different things,” she said.




Chief of these transformations is the introduction of “transformable” PCs, or notebooks that can be used both as a PC and a tablet, thanks to the update to Microsoft’s operating system that allows for better touch input during usage.

In this front, Lenovo is pitting the 13-incher IdeaPad Yoga against similarly positioned notebooks by other vendors, including the XPS 12 from Dell and the Taichi from Asus, as it jockeys for the top PC crown.

Unique about the IdeaPad Yoga is its “revolutionary hinge,” which allows the display to move up to 360 degrees, turning the whole unit into a handy tablet computer.

Powered by Intel’s Core i5 processor, the IdeaPad Yoga runs the latest version of Windows 8 in a slim 16.9-millimeter frame and a battery life that lasts for as much as eight hours.

“With the launch of Windows 8 and Intel’s ultrabook technology, now is the right time for the convertible form factor to take off,” Agorrilla said. “Our convertibles are the perfect ‘do’ machines that users can seamlessly integrate into every aspect of their lifestyle.”

The IdeaPad Yoga will be available locally by the end of December and will retail for P60,995 in stores, while a high-end version running Intel’s Core i7 chip is due for release next year.

source: interaksyon.com

Acer, Samsung loosen grip as Philippine PC market plateaus in Q2 — IDC

MANILA, Philippines — PC shipments to the Philippines stagnated to a meager 1.5-percent growth in the 2nd quarter of the year, with leaders Acer and Samsung losing market share due to overstocking problems, research firm IDC reported recently.

Smaller PC vendors, IDC noted, outperformed both Acer and Samsung during the quarter as the former launched “aggressive pricing and hardware bundling strategies.”

The total number of PC units shipped within the quarter amounted to 551,000, more than half of which were consumer-grade notebooks.

While waning in numbers, the desktop form factor still turned out to be dominant during the 2nd quarter of the year, with over five desktops sold for every four notebooks, IDC found.

During the period, netbooks — or mininotebooks, as IDC calls it — gained renewed prominence among Filipino consumers as the smaller vendors were able to resolve the shortage of netbook processors reported in previous quarters.

“MNC PC brands are starting to encroach upon the market share of one another as the consumer market is not expanding at a rapid enough pace,” explained Juan-Jin Ng, market analyst for client devices research at IDC Asia/Pacific.

“As PC prices grow even more homogenous across most major brands, we will eventually see the stranglehold of the top 2 vendors on the retail market declining over the coming quarters,” he added.

Public-sector PC deployments, IDC noted, grew to a standstill during the second quarter, but incremental rollouts by the Department of Education helped boost commercial PC shipments to a 1.7 percent growth.

IDC believes the resilient Philippine economy, which grew by a rate of 5.9 percent from April to June, had likely contributed to a still positive growth rate during the period.

“The resilience of the economy in the Philippines to the global economic crises as well as the commitment of the current government towards IT spending has kept the overall commercial segment outlook positive,” Juan-Jin added.

Prospects aren’t too bright in the third quarter of the year for PC shipments, though, as vendors hold off on stocking current models in anticipation of Windows 8, due to be released on October 26.

“As such, the PC market should see a boost only in Q4. However, the PC market should find temporary respite in the commercial segment as government and enterprise spending, especially from BPOs, are expected to get underway in Q3,” the IDC analyst said.

source: interaksyon.com