Chuzzlewit,
There is only one truly accurate method to measure market share and eliminate the distortions of seasonality and that is to do this analysis on a rolling 12 month basis. This is how it's done in the consumer products business and it shows the true measure of performance.
I just happen to have these rolling 12 month numbers and growth data for the last 9 quarters.
............World.....growth.....DELL....Growth...Share
..........PC Volume.....%......Volume.....%........%..
Q4, 96.....69324.......n/a......2996......n/a.....4.3
Q1, 97.....72041.......3.9......3381......12.9....4.7
Q2, 97.....74450.......3.3......3732......10.4....5.0
Q3, 97.....77087.......3.5......4157......11.4....5.4
Q4, 97.....80026.......3.8......4707......13.2....5.9
Q1, 98.....81982.......2.4......5330......13.2....6.5
Q2, 98.....83754.......2.2......6123......14.9....7.3
Q3, 98.....86193.......2.9......6901......12.7....8.0
Q4, 98.....89845.......4.2......7721......11.9....8.6
Now, this proves conclusively that the PC market is growing and that DELL's share is growing.
You'll notice, of course, that Q4,98 worldwide volume shot up 4.2% in the Q4 period. That's our little friends from IBM loading up the channel, with some help from Compaq no doubt. Despite this, DELL achieved 8.6% rolling 12 month share, a record and this is a company that sells direct and can't load the channel. To me this means in Q1, 99 the channel will need to get flushed, again, and DELL's share will probably jump to the 9.5% range.
Unfortunately, I didn't have the data the break up this rolling 12 month info into its respective product segments; namely, portables, servers and desktops.
best regards, Gabriel |
