Aussie PC hardware market buoyant: IDC

The Australian PC market grew 9.6 percent in the first calendar quarter compared to the final quarter of 2003, driven by strong notebook sales, according to figures released by IDC.

More than 716,300 desktop, notebook and x86 server units were shipped during Q1, which was a 17.3 percent increase on Q1 2003, IDC said.

The notebook market regained form growing 24.2 percent from Q4 2003 and by 50.8 percent from the same period last year.

The notebook market was the highlight of the quarter, increasing its share by three points to make up over 28 percent of the local PC market during Q1 by units shipped.

The desktop PC market continued to perform below overall market growth, but increased 4.8 percent sequentially in unit shipment terms, IDC said.

"The Australian PC market can simply be defined as one of the most unique in the global market today," said Michael Sager, market analyst, PC hardware at IDC.

"Despite the fact that it is a mature market and one of the first countries to engage in a post Y2K refresh it continues to grow after depressed results in 2001 and 2002.

"While the growth in the first quarter of the year was strong, vendors are watching the value of the Aussie dollar, cost of componentry and growth of the global economy. This should also be a concern as the domestic economy is slowing after years of growth and the potential impact on IT hardware spend by enterprises," he said.

HP was the number one supplier capturing 18.9 percent of the market, followed by Dell (13 percent), Acer (9.3 percent), IBM (7.9 percent) and Toshiba (6.3 percent).