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By Michael Eggebrecht
Increasing consumer demand and revitalized enterprise spending will lead to a 19.7 bump in worldwide PC shipments this year, according to a new projection from Gartner. That is a significant increase from the research firm’s December prediction that 2010 PC sales would rise by 13.3 percent.
A total of 366.1 million PCs will ship in 2010, says Gartner, up from 305.8 million last year. Spending on PCs, meanwhile, will rise 12.2 percent, to $245 billion. Gartner had previously anticipated a mere 1.9 increase in spending.
In the enterprise, economic recovery is expected to allow businesses to finally replace some of their aging PCs. However, growth in desk-based PCs will be “minimal and limited to emerging markets,” cautioned research director George Shiffler in a statement.
More of the growth will come from mobile computers, as an array of new devices will drive consumer interest. Mini-notebooks will account for a sizable chunk of shipments in 2010, said research director George Shiffler, though sales may fade in the coming years as the notebooks compete with low-voltage ultraportables and tablet computers.
“We expect mobile PCs to drive 90 percent of PC growth over the next three years,” said Shiffler. “In 2009, mobile PCs accounted for 55 percent of all PC shipments; by 2012, we expect mobile PCs to account for nearly 70 percent of shipments.”
Driven by Apple’s new iPad, which will begin shipping in April, tablets could present a large opportunity for vendors, says Gartner, which predicts that as many as 10.5 million tablet computers could ship this year. “With the rise of Web-delivered applications, many users no longer need a traditional PC running a resident general-purpose operating system and fast x86 CPU to satisfy their computing needs,” noted analyst Ranjit Atwal. “Apple's iPad is just one of many new devices coming to market that will change the entire PC ecosystem and overlap it with the mobile phone industry.”
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