Household segment pushes PC sales up 26% in Q3: MAIT

NEW DELHI, INDIA: Led by buoyancy in household consumption and a whopping 158 percent rise in laptop sales, the total personal computer (PC) sales (desktops and notebooks combined) surged 26 percent year-on-year, to touch 1.75 million units in the third quarter ended December, 2007.

"The third quarter was driven by increased consumption in the household segment while industry verticals and corporate sectors such as telecom, banking and financial services, manufacturing, e-governance and IT-enabled services, experienced steady growth. The growth in these verticals is expected to continue in the fourth quarter," the Quarterly Industry Performance Review released by hardware association MAIT said.

Apart from the traditional sectors, consumption was also witnessed in small and medium enterprises (SMEs), education, retail and other computer-centric small enterprises. Aggressive pricing by PC vendors has also helped improve the penetration, especially in the households and the SME segments.

With this, the cumulative PC sales for the first three quarters of the fiscal stood at 5.04 million units and are expected touch 7.25 million units at the close of the fiscal.

During October-December, the desktop market grossed 1.25 million units, up four percent over the same period previous year. However, sales were seven percent lower than the sales in the second quarter of the fiscal (sequentially). "Sales are expected to be steady in the quarter January-March as IT sales peak in the last quarter of the financial year," it said.

As per the MAIT-IMRB study, the assembled desktops the smaller lesser known regional brands and unbranded systems, accounted for 32 percent of the PC sales in the third quarter, while the proportion of the branded desktops was 68 percent. MNC brands accounted for 51 percent of the market while the Indian brands accounted for the rest 17 percent.

Notebook sales crossed 5 lakh units, recording 158 percent growth over the third quarter in 2006-07. The high growth in notebook consumption can be attributed to the drop in notebook prices and the additional benefit of mobility and space management.

Notebooks are increasingly finding their way into the homes, SMEs and the education sector. Several first-time PC buyers are now opting for notebooks rather than desktop. High consumption in corporates, IT companies, financial institutes and the government, however, continues to drive the notebook consumption, it added.

Source: MAIT