European Personal Computer Market Grows in
4th Quarter and For All of 1998
Bloomberg News
February 2, 1999, 4:02 p.m. PT
European Computer Market Grows in 4th Qtr and for Full-Year '98
London, Feb. 3 (Bloomberg) -- European personal-computer
sales grew 21.6 percent in the fourth quarter of 1998 and 23
percent for the year as robust consumer demand made Europe the
world's fastest-growing PC market, Dataquest Inc. said.
Sales rose to 9 million units in the three months to Dec.
31 from 7.4 million units in the year-earlier period. Western
European sales rose 27.2 percent to 8.3 million units in the
period, while Eastern European sales fell 20.4 percent.
Sales to consumers rose 45 percent, spurred by lower
prices, the Internet's growing popularity and incentives such as
employee-purchase schemes. Corporate sales increased 14 percent,
helped by spending on preparing computers for the year 2000 and
the European single currency.
''It's the consumer market that's driving the overall
growth,'' said Philip Williams, a PC analyst at Dataquest Inc.
''Consumers are choosing by price rather than brand names and
margins are dropping for vendors.''
Williams said computer makers were moving into higher-end
server and notebook models, as well as different countries, to
compensate for a 20 percent decline in the price of an entry-
level PC. Williams added U.S. sales rose 19 percent in 1998; he
expects European PC sales growth to slow in 1999.
Compaq Computer Corp., the world's No. 2 computer maker,
maintained the top spot, increasing its market share 2.3 percent
to 16.7 percent. International Business Machines Corp., the
world's top computer maker, lost 0.3 percent of the market share
but retained its second place with a 9.5 percent share.
Dell Computer Corp., the No. 1 direct PC seller, ranked
third, benefiting from strong sales in Scandinavia, where
employee-purchase schemes fueled growth. It gained 1.8 percent
for a 7.3 percent market share.
The growing popularity of the Internet boosted sales for
Apple Computer Inc.'s iMac model, putting Apple in 10th place
with a 2.8 percent market share.
Germany led other countries in the number of computers
sold, while Sweden led in terms of sales percentage increase.
German fourth-quarter sales rose 29 percent to 1.92 million
units. The U.K. followed with a 21 percent increase to 1.39
million. French sales rose 27 percent to 1.33 million.
Swedish sales grew 69 percent to 514,535 units. Russian
sales fell 47 percent to 287,551 units. |
