Acer climbs on strong netbooks sales while Dell stumbles
By Alexis • Mar 13th, 2010 • Category: Industry News
- Photo: Acer
iSuppli, the electronics research company that tracks worldwide computer shipping, has announced sales results for 2009. HP retained its position as the number one computer maker in the world, with Dell very nearly falling from second to third and Acer jostling for that number two position.
The list is compiled by adding up the total sales of all desktops, laptops, netbooks and tablet PCs.
The Dell and Acer dance
Dell, whose UK line consists of the Inspiron and XPS in both desktop and laptop form, with Alienware making up its top end range, saw its 2009 worldwide PC shipping drop 9.9% to 38.96 million.
- Photo: Acer
Acer, on the other hand, saw the most growth in the PC industry, adding 29% to 2008’s tally to achieve sales of 38.5 million units. Much of this growth is attributable to Acer’s very strong position in the notebooks and netbooks market, with the Acer Aspire One A110 experiencing particularly strong sales in the UK market. According to iSuppli, 80% of Acer’s sales came from the notebook market.
These two figures separate worldwide unit sales number between Dell and Acer by a mere 460,000, meaning unless Dell can stem the tide, Acer is likely to overtake its position as soon as the first quarter of 2010.
HP, Lenovo and Toshiba
- Photo: Lenovo
The disturbing thing for Dell is all four of the other top five PC makers experienced growth in 2009. HP, the market leader whose PCs in 2009 made up 19.7% of the market, grew 7.4% in 2009, selling 59.6 million units. The perennial top-seller in the form of the HP Pavilion range continued to rake in big sales for the company. Lenovo and Toshiba rounded out iSuppli’s list, with sales of 24.9 million units and 15.4 million units respectively.
How Dell will stem the tide of continuous weakness in a stronger post-recession market must be wracking the brains of all the higher-ups at the PC giant, while focusing the attention of analysts and onlookers alike on the next iSuppli report. Whether it’s with tablet PCs, netbooks or a completely different strategy, the company needs to throw something and pray it sticks.
Tags for this article: iSuppli, netbooks
