Coronavirus Gives Sugar Hit To PC, Tablet Sales

Tablet and PC sales are forecast to grow 3.3 per cent this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Market intelligence analyst International Data Corporation (IDC) predicts shipment volumes will reach 425.7 million units this year, fuelled by people working at home or stuck in quarantine lockdowns.

According to David Myhrer, research vice president for IDC’s Consumer Technology Strategy Service, this is notable as 2019 was itself a strong year for PCs due to preparations for the Windows 7 end-of-life transition.

“Consumers have been stuck at home, unable to spend on restaurants, movies, and other day-to-day activities.

“Technology has been the big winner in all of this as device spending has been especially surprising, with spend at year-end, holiday-like levels throughout much of the second quarter,” he said.

IDC does not believe this surge will last, however, with the economic uncertainty predicted to return the personal computing devices (PCD) market to long-term decline in 2021. Jitesh Ubrani, research manager for IDC’s Worldwide Mobile Device Trackers, forecasts a -2.2 per cent compound annual growth rate, with only 389.6 million units expected to ship in 2024.

“Schools around the world are already scrambling to procure notebooks for their students. The excessive demand, some short-term component shortages, and general uncertainty about the upcoming school year have led many schools to purchase as many units as they can.

“Unfortunately, these additional purchases during 2020 means that many schools will have blown through their future budgets, which will contribute to double-digit declines in the education segment during 2021 and 2022,” said Ubrani.