Gartner Says Strong Notebook Sales Helped Drive Latin American PC Market to an 8 Percent Increase in 2003
STAMFORD, CONN., February 25, 2004 — Declining interest rates in Brazil, Colombia's robust performance and strong growth in the notebook market helped propel PC shipments in Latin America to 9 million units in 2003, a 7.7 percent increase from the same period last year, according to Gartner, Inc.
"Notebook shipments grew 21.4 percent in 2003, as the top-tier vendors, such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and Sony, all experienced double-digit growth in this market," said Luis Anavitarte, vice president and research director for Gartner's Computing Platforms Latin America group. "With declining prices and expanding wi-fi connectivity, notebook PCs are slowly stealing share from desktop PCs as some businesses and middle-income consumers opt for mobility when making new purchases."
HP continued to lead the overall PC market in Latin America in 2003 with 11.2 percent market share (see Table 1), despite a 12.6 percent decline in shipments. Among international vendors, Dell and Toshiba experienced an increase in shipments in 2003. Non-branded system's builders experienced 19 percent growth.
Table 1
Latin America PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 2003 (Units)
Company
2003 Shipments
2003 Market Share (%)
2002 Shipments
2002 Market Share (%)
Growth (%)
Hewlett-Packard
1,011,415
11.2
1,157,650
13.7
-12.6
Dell
596,182
6.6
468,126
5.6
27.4
IBM
360,326
4.0
461,331
5.5
-21.9
Alaska
203,092
2.2
231,669
2.6
-12.3
Toshiba
143,683
1.6
131,103
1.5
9.6
Others
6,739,055
74.4
5,956,473
70.8
13.1
Total
9.053,753
100.0
8,406,352
100.0
7.7
Note: Table includes desk-based PCs and notebooks.
Source: Gartner Dataquest (February 2004)
"Top-tier vendors performed better in the second half of 2003, as there was increased demand in the professional market," said Anavitarte. "The PC corporate and government segments have been unstable since the middle of 2001. We are seeing signs that the trend is being reversed. Enterprises need to update their systems and applications to remain competitive."
The notebook PC consumer segment ended 2003 with 19 percent growth. In this same period, the desktop PC consumer segment declined 1 percent. Growth rates of new purchases and replacements in the home clearly favored the notebook PC as price points went down and wireless connectivity increased in the region.
Brazil remained the No. 1 nation for PC shipments in the region with 3.9 million units shipped. On a global basis, Brazil is now the No. 7 country in the world for PC shipments, up from No. 8 in 2002.
Mexico continued as the No. 2 country despite a shipments decline of 8.4 percent in 2003. "Mexico did end the year with better-than-expected results in the last quarter of 2003. However it was difficult to surpass the strong fourth quarter of 2002 when various government PC purchases took place," said Anavitarte.
Argentina recorded the strongest growth rate with 230 percent. "Shipments in excess of 362,000 units in the year points to greater-than-expected economic activity and IT adoption fundamentally in the professional space," said Anavitarte. "This is remarkable considering the limited credit availability in the country for IT acquisitions."
Colombia, Chile and Peru all experienced positive growth in 2003. Colombia, the No. 3 country in PC shipments, had shipments of 465,392, buoyed by HP's contract for the Empresas Publicas de Medellin PC project.
This information is produced by Gartner's Computing Platforms Latin America group. The group provides research on key aspects of the dynamic PC, server and printer hardware markets in Latin America. The focus is on regional and country issues in the top eight Latin American markets and the Rest of Latin America (ROLA) category, where Central American and Caribbean countries are grouped. To subscribe to this program, please call 408-468-8000.
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