PC Sales Set to Decline For Years, Analyst Warns
PC industry blamed for not recognizing and adapting to consumer's interest in tablets.
It's already a known fact that the PC industry is set to experience its first decline in over a decade due to emerging technologies, but an analyst has warned that the decline will continue for several years to come.
Barclays Capital's hardware analyst Ben Reitzes, who decreased his outlook for the division through 2016, warned that sales of "PCs could decline for many years to come". He blamed several factors for the expected decline such as increased interest in tablets, as well as confusion over Microsoft's Windows 8 operating system.
"We are lowering our 2012-2016 PC forecasts due to weak macro conditions, confusion around Windows 8, ongoing cannibalization from tablets, and an elongation in replacement cycles," Reitzes said in a research note. He blamed the PC industry for not recognizing and adapting to consumers' interest moving towards mobile devices.
We believe a new generation of consumers and IT workers are figuring out how to compute differently than those that started using PC's in the 90's - relying more on mobile devices and the cloud - as PC's see significant "task infringement" by the day. As a result, it can no longer be assumed that the PC market can remain in the range of 350 million units a year - and we argue that the PC replacement cycle is in the process of being elongated by 1-2 years, resulting in the loss of 50-100 million units in annualized demand by 2015. After years of denial, most PC industry players still don't seem to realize what is happening - and don't have contingency plans.
Reitzes' 2012 forecast for PC units sold decreased to 352.75 million units, represent a 3 percent slip. His 2013 prediction stands at 338.34 million, a 4 percent decline from his previous forecast on sales figures for the ailing PC division.
Estimates for the tablet market, meanwhile, increased. 182 million units are expected to be sold in 2013, which was previously 146 million. In 2014, Reitzes increased his 139 million estimate to 230 million.
The analyst expects Apple to dictate the majority of the tablet market, at least through 2016. He stated that Google, Samsung and Amazon "have the ability to expand the non-Apple market quite a bit and we believe these 3 companies can sustain 30-40% share of the market (combined) over the longer term."
/fixed the title for you
/fixed the title for you
These analysts don't know a thing. They take numbers from companies like HP, Dell etc for analysis. Thanks to weird pricing, branded computers costs similar or sometimes even more than their laptop equivalent. Basic i5 laptop costs 600$ where I live and if you're going for a PC then you get i3 based PC in same money.
These days people have grown a little intellect and they have started building their own rigs as opposed to buy branded ones and these so called analysts don't count custom built rigs.
In fact I don't think my family members would notice if I rebuilt the old computer in the living room, unless I decided to throw in a SSD. Than they might notice due a difference during boot up and thats it.
What they didn't mention or probably realized is that PCs is simply getting set aside on task that it does best,. productivity and content creation, whereas before it serves a much broader function until the introduction of tablets and smartphones.
The PC is here to stay- even in the extreme case of being a niche product.
1.) Lost billions in a housing crash/credit freeze that was predicted by several dozen major economists, and,
2.) Just recently got busted for trying to manipulate numbers to cover up losses from number 1.)
Why do we care what liars say?
This is in contrast to PC's built before and in the early 2000's, where they would be considered too underpowered and slow to do these functions nowadays and hence require upgrading.
And this isn't even mentioning factors such as the GFC/unemployment that would have impacted sales....
The mobile market IS full of mobile PCs. They are called laptops, tablets and smart-phones.
(1) Intel should move faster in making lower power CPU. Microsoft should have move faster to creating a new "mobile" mode of Windows in which non-essential background tasks are cut to minimum. The user is able to turn on/off such mode when the need to save power arises.
(2) Microsoft, should have done more to make touch interface easier to use in traditional desktop mode. Create a stylus that works like Galaxy Note 2 S pen, create semi-transparent virtual keyboard that can anchor to various side of the desktop (top,down,left,right,split among 4-corners etc), create virtual mouse pad and mouse buttons on screen, create virtual magnifier that allows user to zoom in selected portion of screen such as a menu, so that it is easier to click on the right menu/button. The list goes on. There are many innovative ideas one can have to make traditional UI more usable in touch based environment. But Microsoft just decides to play the sheep and follow Apple footstep.
(3) Hardware vendor should have implemented more IPS screen, GPS sensor etc into their notebooks so that it looks better and able to do some of the things tablets can normally do. After, the cost of such things are not that high as Google Nexus 7 can do all this within $200.
Having said that, PC being more powerful, will never be as cheap as some of the tablets in the market nowadays. So a certain portion of the market who just want to listen to music or watch video will be lost forever. But then again, maybe some of those people will find the need to buy a PC for other purposes as well.
"Decline thanks to win8" --> win8 is clearly not helping things....MS is gambling a lot on portable devices/touchscreens, with a significantly risky knock-on effect in the industry surrounding the standard PC.
Tech always advances (doh!) and thus: hardware will always reduce in size, greater functionality will appear in 'lower end' / smaller sized devices, etc., etc., (another doh?)
There will be a commercially very significant number of folk who think they will be happy with tablet devices / ultrabooks, and that's fine for them....we've no problems with that (though this will reduce permanently (or temporarily?) the global 'regular PC pool'). Of course, as we all know and as many of those who don't and ask questions on forums like this, tablets/ultrabooks/laptops/phones always fall very, very short of delivering the functionality/graphic & CPU horsepower, flexibility, economical upgradeability of a 'proper/real' PC. Little Jimmy is going to be very disappointed when he compares the look and playability of his latest blockbuster game on his jack-mini-i-of-all-tab-phone-trades to his friends regular PC/monitor combo.
I think hardware manufacturers and software developers need to work closer together to advertise and push the advantages of the regular PC model. We need more of the old 'killer' titles. This should be very easy to do for gaming, for example, by making sure that video adverts show the clear distinction between different platforms. With this, developers MUST stop simply porting and instead, properly develop for the PC ---> we've covered this many times before but unfortunately, most developers are still only interested in the easy route....they must be aware that 'grown-up' gamers will turn their backs on them and will very likely re-think who they purchase titles from for their future/current young 'uns.
What about about graphic/video editing, audio recording/editing, etc.?
Just my 2 cents.
But the most probable cause for such a drop is that most people that buy technology already have a PC that is likely way more powerful than any tablet out there.
Truth be told, however, such talk can be good since it has the potntial to lower prices on PCs and their parts.
Mind you, automation as such is not anything bad, and we had the capacity to do this decades ago - but within a monetary system it results in people being unable to get money which was created to be crucial for ones survival (let alone anything else) - even though money is an idiotic notion that stopped representing resources 100 years ago.
Samsung, Google and Amazon to have 30-40% market share?
Samsung and amazon use Google's andriod platform. so shouldn't that be Android will have 30-40% market share?
I also think he is underestimating MS's entry into the tablet market.