Apple number 3 PC vendor in US after Q3 sales surge

Stan Beer
Friday, 19 October 2007 04:11

IT Industry - Market

The Apple Macintosh is the clear number 3 selling PC in the US market, posting a 15.9% year on year gain in unit sales for the third quarter 2007, according to IDC figures. Meanwhile HP, with an even more impressive sales gain of 16.9% is fast closing in on US market leader Dell, which suffered a year on year shipment drop of 4.8% for the quarter.

According to IDC, the Mac, which shipped 1.13 million units, has maintained its lead over notebook specialist Toshiba, which shipped 940,000 units and widened the gap with Gateway, which lost market share shipping 805,000 units. HP shipped 4.346 million units, putting it within striking distance of Dell which shipped 5.010 million units.

Worldwide, however, HP is now the clear market leader with 19.6% market share and 13.094 million units shipped in Q3, followed by Dell whose market share has slipped to 15.2% with 10.018 million units shipped. In Q3 2006, HP and Dell were locked in a titanic struggle for market leadership with almost identifical numbers of units shipped.

Although the IDC figures show Lenovo as being the number three PC vendor worldwide, just ahead of Acer, that position is likely to be reversed when the next set of figures are released as Acer has acquired Gateway. However, Acer still posted an impressive year on year shipments growth of 59.2%, while Lenovo shipments grew 22.9%.

Overall, global PC shipments grew year on year 15.5% for Q3 2007 on the back of strong laptop sales, according to IDC.