Top PC ranks hold steady in Q4
The rankings of the Top-5 PC makers remained the same in the fourth quarter compared to the third.

Hewlett-Packard Co. retained its No.-1 ranking in the fourth quarter of 2008, with shipments of 14.5 million, and a market share of 18.6 percent. Dell Inc. maintained its second-place ranking with shipments of 10.3 million, giving the company a market share of 13.2 percent. Rounding out the Top-3 was Acer, with a market share of 11.8 percent resulting from shipments of 9.2 million units during the quarter. The other Top-5 PC OEMs were Lenovo and Toshiba, ranked fourth and fifth, respectively, with market shares of 7.1 and 4.7 percent.

Acer advances in 2008
For the full-year 2008, Acer achieved growth well in excess of the overall industry, at 57.9 percent, while the No.-1 and No.-2 ranked PC OEMs—Hewlett-Packard and Dell—experienced growth in line with the overall industry, at 12.9 and 9.5 percent, respectively.

Outside the Top 10, ASUS and Apple Inc. both made notable advances in 2008, with ASUS expanding its shipments by 145 percent, and Apple by 30 percent.

“ASUS played a crucial role in expanding the fast-growing netbook segment, clearly boosting the company’s performance,” Wilkins said. “Apple benefited from the boom in consumer PC shipments in 2008.”

The tables present iSuppli’s estimates of global PC market share in the fourth quarter and the full year of 2008. This ranking comprises all shipments of desktop and notebook PCs as well as entry-level servers.

iSuppli Table 1: Top-10 PC Market Share Rankings in the Fourth Quarter of 2008 (Ranking by Units in Thousands)

Source: iSuppli Corp. March 2009

iSuppli Table 2: Top-10 PC Market Share Rankings in the Fourth Quarter of 2008 (Ranking by Units in Thousands)

Source: iSuppli Corp. March 2009