Global PC shipments grew 1.5% in second quarter, Gartner says
Trade disputes bring uncertainty to PC demand in the near future, analysts say.
Worldwide shipments of PCs grew 1.5% in the second quarter of 2019 after two quarters of decline, according to a preliminary Thursday report from Gartner. Sixty-three million units shipped in Q2 2019, compared with 62 million units the same time last year, the report says.
That growth was "driven by demand from the Windows 10 refresh in the business market" in the second quarter, said Mikako Kitagawa, Gartner senior principal analyst. "Desktop PC growth was strong, which offset a decline in mobile PC shipments."
Lenovo , HP and Dell were the top three vendors and made up just over 64% of global PC shipments, according to the report. They made up 60.7% of shipments in the second quarter of 2018.
In the US, 14 million PCs were shipped in Q2, down 0.4% from the same time last year, Gartner says. HP and Dell remained in the No. 1 and No. 2 spots for shipments, respectively. PC shipments in Asia/Pacific dropped 1% compared with last year, largely due to a weak market in China, Gartner says.
But ongoing trade disputes and the threat of tariffs lend some uncertainty to PC demand in the near future, Gartner says.
"While the U.S.-China trade war did not impact the PC market in the second quarter of 2019, the next
phase of tariffs could have significant impact," Kitagawa said. "Most
laptops
and
tablets
are currently manufactured in China and sales of these devices in the U.S. could face significant price increases if the punitive tariffs are imposed and vendors do not take quick action to respond."