Wed, 11 Jul 2012 14:11:50 PDT
Research firm Gartner today released its preliminary personal computer
shipment data for the second quarter of 2012, offering up a picture of
market performance during the quarter. While Apple experienced only small
year-over-year unit growth of 4.3% in the United States, the company was the
only one of the top five vendors to see year-over-year growth and the
company once again outperformed the overall industry and its 5.7% decline.
Gartner's Preliminary U.S. PC Vendor Unit Shipment Estimates for 2Q12 (
Thousands of Units)
Apple's share of the U.S. market rose to 12.0% for the quarter after two
straight quarters of decline due to the company's seasonality. The figure,
which allowed Apple to consolidate its hold on the third position in the U.S
. market behind HP and Dell, marked Apple's second best performance in
recent years following a 12.9% share in the third quarter of 2011. The
third quarter, which includes back-to-school purchases in many of Apple's
strongest markets, is typically its best-performing quarter.
Apple's U.S. Market Share Trend: 1Q06-2Q12 (Gartner)
As usual, Gartner did not cover Apple's worldwide market share for the
quarter, as the company does not rank among the top five vendors on a
worldwide basis. PC shipments experienced a 0.1% year-over-year decline on a
worldwide basis, with strong growth from Asus and Lenovo being offset by
declines from HP and Dell.
Update: IDC has released its own estimates for the quarter, pegging Apple at
a 1.1% year-over-year decline in U.S. shipments and an 11.4% share of that
market. IDC estimated that Lenovo was able to enter the top five on the
strength of a 6.1% year-over-year gain, but the overall U.S. market was much
weaker than expected in registering a 10.6% drop.
