Italians love wine, women, football and the Asus Eee PC

Davey Winder
Thursday, 03 July 2008 18:02

IT Industry - Market

The Italian PC market has seen double-digit growth in 2008, with the sales of consumer laptops rising by 35.8 percent compared to this time last year. As a share of all the PCs sold, the figures are even more surprising: 69 percent are now laptops. IDC maintains that much of the additional momentum has been created by the launch of the Asus Eee PC...


According to IDC, sustained laptop sales growth is a given amongst Italian consumers who just couldn't get enough during the first quarter of 2008. It's EMEA Quarterly PC Tracker gathers data from 55 countries and analyses this by vendor, product, brand, channel and even notebook screen size. If you want to know how a particular brand of laptop is selling in Europe, you go ask IDC.

The latest report highlights just how much the Italians love their laptops. IDC says that sustained notebook demand has been the key engine of market dynamics, particularly in the consumer space, resulting in that 35.8% year-on-year growth.

It reveals that there has been fierce competition between brands in the retail market, plus a number of increasingly attractive products and new designs at affordable prices. Indeed, the transition to mobile computing has continued pretty continued unabated as can be seen by that truly astounding statistic of notebooks accounting for 69 percent of all PC sales.

Could it also be that the ever fashion-conscious Italians have fallen in love with the Asus Eee PC? IDC admit that, for the first time, ultra portable notebooks have become affordable to a much wider customer base as a result of this one product. Throw in the Internet-centric design and value proposition, and Asus certainly appear to have hit the Italian mother load.

Something, IDC suggests, other manufacturers cannot have helped but notice. It says that an "increasing number of low-cost models will hit the market in the second half of the year, which, coupled with telco offers, will create additional buoyancy in the consumer notebook space this year."

Not just for the young and trendy, who else is buying into the Asus Eee PC lifestyle? read on to find out...

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