U.S analyst company Canalys reports that shipments of desktops and notebooks has risen 55 per cent year on year throughout Q1 2021.
The total shipment of 82.7 million units worldwide is impressive, although the percentage rise is somewhat misleading, given the disruptive 2020 we had. Backlogs from 2020 also added significantly to this strong Q1 performance.
Shipments of notebooks and mobile workstations increased 79% year on year to reach 67.8 million units. Tablets are not included in these calculations.
“The supply chain issue plaguing the industry is a good problem to have,” said Rushabh Doshi, Canalys Research Director. “As average prices rise due to the scarcity of internal hardware, innovation in design is triggering long-term changes to the way PC vendors approach supply and demand.
“Chipmakers, too, are now bullish about personal computing, and have increased their planned future investments to capitalise on the long-term opportunity. While the pandemic is not over just yet, there is light at the end of the tunnel. This is also spurring SMB investment in computing, which halted abruptly in 2020.”
These impressive result are not expected to last, given worldwide parts shortages.
“Despite the concerted efforts of the supply chain to ramp up production, Canalys expects the PC market to be supply-constrained for most of this year,” Ishan Dutt, from Canalys, explains.
“Adding to this, the potential for more black swan events to create even more disruption and uncertainty looms large. The hindering effect of shortages on countries’ economic revivals should be a wake-up call for governments to increase investment in semiconductor manufacturing.”
