Acer Australia revenues have jumped from $293M to $369M during COVID-19 lockdowns an increase of $76M, with Q4 2020 which was the outbreak period being a major contributor after sales jumped 98.1% over the prior year.
The COVID-19 performance was driven by demand for the companies Predator gaming machines and education departments, arming students with new laptops for students working from home. They also saw a significant increase in sales in the B2B market.
Also contributing to their overall growth was a surge in sales at Harvey Norman where the Company is witnessing record demand for their gaming and consumer notebooks as well as gaming workstations.
At a function last night in Sydney to showcase their 2021 line-up of products, which include a new range of Concept D computers, the Company had an embarrassing moment when after telling the audience that their new notebooks had long battery life the battery on the notebook running the PowerPoint presentation failed leaving a message on the screen saying, “low on battery”, it then shut down.
Acer also revealed the results of a COVID-19 research study though it was not revealed how many people were questioned or how the research was conducted.
Rod Bassi Sales Director at Acer claimed that 4.3M Australians worked from home during the past year and that today employees are demanding greater work flexibility.
On the other hand, business executives are now trying to get staff back to work. 28% of SMB workers in Australia were mobile and that 14% of businesses quickly developed a mobile strategy when COVID-19 hibernation first hit.
Acer claimed that, today 91% of businesses are implementing work from home strategies.
This has been disputed by several Companies who claim their staff are now back working from an office.
Goldman Sachs boss David Solomon earlier this week rejected remote working as a “new normal” and labelled it an “aberration” instead.
Mr Solomon said the investment bank had operated throughout 2020 with “less than 10% of our people” in the office.
Acer claims 74% of Companies expect to allocate 27% more time for remote working despite several bosses not trusting their staff when working from home.
Talking about Acers performance during the pandemic Bassi said “We did not sink especially as the beginning of COVID-19 was an uncertain period”.
“Now it’s all about supply and meeting the increased demand we are experiencing” he said.
