Gartner Sees An Uptick In Fourth Quarter PC Sales, But Is Less Upbeat About Windows 7

June 26, 2009

The global downturn has put the hurt on personal computer sales, with the market expected to be down 6 percent this year.

PC sales are forecast to climb 10.3 percent next year

PC sales are forecast to climb 10.3 percent next year

But the tide is turning. Fourth-quarter sales should rise after nine months of declines, and 2010 should see a surprising rebound.

This more optimistic outlook comes from Gartner and represents a revision of the research firm’s May forecast. Then, the firm expected a 6.6 percent drop in the market this year

Gartner says it anticipates the second and third quarters to see 10 percent declines followed by an increase in the fourth quarter. Shipments are projected to grow 10.3 percent in 2010.

While it is too early to say the worst of the market decline is over, the forecast is another sign that the economy has reached the bottom of the turn down.

The market appears to be strengthening, Gartner says in a press release. Part of the reason is the strength of netbooks, or small notebooks. Netbook shipments should reach 21 million units this year and 30 million next year. Mobile PCs, in total, will climb 4 percent this year while desktops fall almost 16 percent.

One observation from Gartner may prove wrong: “the impact of Windows 7’s release in October on the PC market is likely to be very modest.” Unless Microsoft mounts a big marketing campaign, consumers will wait to adopt it with new PC purchases, the firm says.

I don’t dispute the impact may be modest. But on the other hand, don’t dismiss the possibility of a big marketing splash from the Redmond marketing machine.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Telcos Seen Playing A Bigger Role With Mobile PCs

June 2, 2009

As consumers becoming increasingly interested in buying PCs from third-party merchants (instead of directly from a Dell or Apple) an important new outlet for computers is expected to grow.

Direct PC marketers seen at a disadvantage

Direct PC marketers seen at a disadvantage

That outlet is the national and global telecom, where people already go to snap up mobile phones and cellular computer connections.

In a press release on Tuesday, Gartner said it expects that 80 percent of PCs will be bought indirectly, or from third-party merchants, in three years. Today about 74 percent of PCs are, which is up from 67 percent five years ago.

This is obviously not good news for Dell. Perhaps this is partly behind the 63 percent profit drop the company reported last week.

In any event, the trend could play to telecoms as they bundle mini-notebooks with 3G cellular access. Gartner said it anticipates companies will become much more active in the United States, Western Europe, Japan, Singapore and Taiwan.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

IT Projects On Hold But Not Eliminated Entirely

May 14, 2009

Here’s some good news for the rebound, whenever it comes.

Hardware spending is being hit harder than other areas of IT

Hardware spending is being hit harder than other areas of IT

According to Gartner, more far more corporate technology buyers are delaying computing projects than canceling them. Only 12 percent of companies surveyed in February and March have outright eliminated a project.

What that suggests is many of the projects will be dusted off and carried forward when corporate money begins flowing again.

The survey found that spending on hardware will be hardest hit. Gartner projects overall IT spending will decline 3.7 percent this year, before rebounding 2.4 percent next year.

Hardware spending nonetheless will fall 14.9 percent in 2009, much worse than the IT market in general. Even next year, hardware – including purchases of PCs, servers and storage – will lag, growing just 0.8 percent.

Of course, conditions will vary greatly around the world. Projects in India and China are much more likely to go forward this year and projects in the U.S. and Europe.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Smaller Is Better When Developing For The Web

May 11, 2009

We may have reached a bottom to the recession, if CEOs at bellwethers Intel and Cisco Systems are to be believed. But times are far from good.

Sharpen the focus on less ambitious efforts, says Gartner

Sharpen the focus on less ambitious efforts, says Gartner

Unemployment continues to slide, corporate spending is cautious and consumers remain tight fisted.

In this environment, cutting costs is the surest path to survival. Which is why an observation from Gartner struck me as on target – and not just in today’s rough times but good ones as well.

Gartner on Monday released several guidelines for watching the bottom line as companies continue to push e-commerce initiatives. Some perfunctory suggestions were included: use off-the-shelf tools, negotiate hard with software vendors.

The most significant insight was one that smart companies already follow: Rather than randomly building online communities around a corporate Web site, target existing communities, and stay focused on converting these smaller efforts. Here is the way Gartner states it:

“Leverage established community Web sites rather than building communities in your organization’s site.” And with Web 2.0 sales tools, “scale back their development efforts to only those tools that will lead to higher conversion rates. Gartner estimates that this strategy will save around 10 percent for large enterprises and about 5 percent for small enterprises in 2009, and 5 percent in future years.”

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Posted by Mark Boslet

H-P Passes Dell In U.S. PC Sales; But Industry Continues Decline

April 15, 2009
Apple needs to come up with a low cost PC to reverse the slide of its Macintosh sales (mock up by Isamu Sanada)

Apple needs to come up with a low cost PC to weather the downturn (mock up by Isamu Sanada)

H-P is now the world’s undisputed leader of the computer market, period.

Until today, Dell always bragged that it was selling more PCs in the U.S. market than its Palo Alto, Calif.-rival.

But according to studies released today by analyst firms Gartner and IDC, H-P now holds the crown with a 27.6 percent market share, ahead of Dell at 26.3 percent.

Low-cost PC sales growth helped avoid steeper fall

However, today’s analysts findings contradict Intel’s CEO Paul Otellini optimistic comments made yesterday about an end of the PC industry slide, as worldwide PC shipments for the first quarter of 2009 continue to decline: -7.1 percent compared to the same quarter a year ago for IDC and -6.5 percent for Gartner.

Apple also suffered from the continuing downturn and saw a 1.1 percent decline globally of its Macintosh sales. “Apple’s relatively higher ASP (average selling price) created challenges for it in the tough economy,” said Gartner analysts.

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Posted by TechPulse 360

The Final Numbers Are In: Chip Market Down 5.4% In 2008

April 10, 2009

A steep decline in the fourth quarter turned the tables on an otherwise stable market, sending sales down 5.4 percent in 2008.

This year could be a lot worse.

Gartner said its final analysis of the 2008 market showed worldwide sales of $255 billion, off $14.5 billion from 2007. The research firm monitors 275 chip suppliers.

Because of the recession, “we can expect considerable market consolidation going forward,” said Principal Research Analyst Peter Middleton.

Intel, the largest semiconductor company, saw sales fall a modest 0.5 percent last year. But number two company Samsung suffered a 15 percent plunge. Qualcomn, the eighth largest company, saw sales rise 15.3 percent, the best performance among the top 10.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Global Information Technology Spending To Fall 3.8% This Year

March 31, 2009

Spending on information technology is forecast to fall more rapidly this year that in 2001, when the dot-com bubble burst.

Gartner on Tuesday predicted that the worldwide IT market will drop 3.8 percent this year. The decrease will surpass the 2.1 percent decline following the tech collapse of 2001.

Businesses and consumers have reacted to the downturn with remarkable ‘speed and severity,” says Richard Gordon, a research vice president at Gartner.

Buyers are favoring lower price products,, delaying the replacement of older gear and sticking with current service contracts instead of upgrading.

Spending this year should be $3.2 trillion, with computer hardware feeling the brunt of the pull back. Sales should fall 14.9 percent. The software market should grow 0.3 percent while services will contract 1.7 percent.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Businesses Start To Use Twitter Style Microblogging For Promotion, Intelligence

March 27, 2009

Web 2.0 technologies typically start with consumers and eventually, somewhat reluctantly, make their way to business.

Think of social networks, wikis, even search.

Microblogging, with its poster child Twitter, seems to be following this well-established path. Companies have begun putting short-length micro-communications (Twitter posts are only up to 140 characters) to work promoting their reputations and mining data from customers and suppliers.

By 2011, most social media software will have business microblogging, says Gartner

By 2011, most social media software will have business microblogging, says Gartner

Anticipating this will continue, Gartner predicts that by 2011, business microblogging will be a standard feature in 80 percent of the social media software on the market.

Today the early corporate adopters are using Twitter as a public relations channel, establishing Twitter identities, posting on corporate accomplishments and linking to press releases.

Twitter also has proven effective at drawing consumers to company blogs.

Meanwhile, employees have begun using microblogging internally to communicate about projects they are working on and ideas that occur to them, according to a Gartner study.

In a similar vein, searching Twitter streams can produce useful information on what customers, competitors and suppliers are saying about a company. Because of Twitter’s lack confidentiality, Gartner does not recommend let employees discuss business topics on the site.

Despite this, it is clear business will incorporate microblogging in some shape or form.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

Newspapers Missing The Online Opportunities Of Social Media

March 25, 2009

Here are some of the more intelligent recommendations I have seen recently for the troubled newspaper industry.

Why not let readers Tweet stories they like?

Why not let readers Tweet stories they like?

Most local newspapers are notoriously bad at harnessing the power of the Internet to rescue their ailing old-line businesses. But the tools to reverse this are available in the latest wave of social media Web sites and search tools – including Twitter, according to Gartner.

And the benefits might be considerable.

Newspapers are clearly suffering. Many metropolitan dailies are hanging by threads, with advertising revenue falling 10 percent or 20 percent or more a month, and several cites, such as San Francisco and Philadelphia, likely to go dark.

But newspapers aren’t harnessing the power for this most important asset: loyal readers.

In a survey late last year, Gartner found about 49 percent of respondents in the U.S., U.K. and Italy use search engines once a week or more to find content. But only 20 percent use search tools built into a newspaper or magazine site.

So why not improve those tools and make them more prominent on newspaper Web sites?

Many newspapers similarly list their staffers who are on the influential microblogging  site Twitter, but few offer Twitter users the ability to “tweet” stories from their Web sites, says Gartner.

In a similar vien, 24 percent of those surveyed said they share good content with friends via personal communications, such as e-mail and instant messaging. But how many newspapers: think of this as a major source of distribution?

All these ideas are worth considering in a desperate environment.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

North America Takes Lead With Smartphones

March 13, 2009

Like most other areas of the economy, the cellular handset business felt the pinch of the global downturn in the fourth quarter.

But high-end smartphones continued to sell at a respectable pace, and in North American in particular.

A ful 20% of phones sold in North America in the fourth quarter were smartphones

A ful 20% of phones sold in North America in the fourth quarter were smartphones

Around the world, smartphone sales rose 3.7 percent in the final quarter of 2008, making up 12 percent of all mobile handsets sold, Gartner reported this week.

North America is at the front of this trend toward more fully featured Internet-enable phones, such as Apple’s iPhone and the latest Blackberrys from Research in Motion.

A full 20 percent of phone sales in the region were smartphones, a big increase from last year, says Gartner. For all of 2008, growth was 68 percent.

Smartphone sales in Asia/Pacific rose just 2.3 percent, while in Europe, the Middle East and Africa sales were up just 2 percent. In Western Europe, smartphone sales increased 9.6 percent.

Interesting shift in the mobile landscape.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

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