MORRISVILLE – Two tech research firms jointly declared Lenovo the No. 1 PC seller in the world – again – on Wednesday.
Gartner and IDC declared Lenovo as the leader with both firms citing the company’s resurgence in sales across the US market and the benefit of sales through its new joint venture with Fujitsu.
The uptick in sales came even though global PC shipments fell slightly overall. Lenovo lost the No. 1 PC sales slot in both the IDC and Gartner reports during the second quarter of 2017, ending a four-year hold on that rank. Gartner reported in July that Lenovo was slightly back in front after the second quarter, but Wednesday’s news gave the international tech giant a clean sweep of the most closely watched industry reports.
Lenovo trends back to No. 1
Lenovo’s sales surged nearly 11 percent globally according to the third quarter report from Gartner. Its global market share climbed to nearly 24 percent as sales neared 16 million. HP came in second at 21.8 percent market share following a 5 percent increase in sales. Dell was a distant third.
IDC said Lenovo sales climbed nearly 6 percent, giving Lenovo a 24 percent market share with over 16 million in shipments. HP and Dell were second and third respectively.
IDC cited the boost of several hundred thousand sales from the Fujitsu joint venture, which closed earlier this year, as a positive factor for Lenovo. But perhaps more importantly IDC analysts declared that Lenovo had found its footing and drove up US sales – a market in which it had faltered.
“The company saw a marked improvement in its North American business in the wake of a revamped channel strategy and more stable management,” IDC wrote.
Gartner statistics showed that Lenovo’s US sales climbed more than 22 percent to nearly 2.3 million for the quarter. Its market share increased to 15.4 percent from 12.6 percent, thus lifting Lenovo past Apple (13.7 percent) into third place behind No. 1 HP and No. 2 Dell.
Once again, Lenovo bucked the industry trend. Overall, US sales dipped 0.4 percent. But Gartner saw good news in the slight US market decline as well as the global market.
“Despite looming concerns around CPU shortages, the PC market in the U.S. turned in a good quarter backed by strong results in the notebook segment,” said Neha Mahajan, a senior research analyst. “Healthy business PC volume, steady Chromebook shipments to U.S. K-12, and a growing gaming consumer base have been the key reasons for the optimism around the U.S. PC markets.”
Jay Chou, Gartner’s research manager for its PC Tracker report, pointed out that the third quarter overall was “better than expected.”
“But the outlook remains uncertain as we head into the holiday season, when volume will be boosted by many consumer-oriented promotions in entry-level SKUs. AMD supply could help with processor demand somewhat, but it will also take time for OEMs to spec in more models,” Chou added.
Here’s what IDC had to say about Lenovo’s top competitors:
- HP Inc. grew a modest 0.3% year on year but still reached its tenth consecutive quarter of year-on-year growth and slightly outgrew its market share from a year ago. It faced a tough quarter in the U.S. as well as Latin America.
- Dell Inc. tied with Lenovo in terms of year-on-year growth at 5.8% and further expanded its market share versus a year ago. A strong showing in desktop volume overall and a great EMEA quarter were the driving forces behind its results.
- Acer climbed to 4th place with strong performances in education and gaming. The company has continued to focus on building out a comprehensive Chrome OS portfolio and its gaming notebooks have also garnered significant uptake.
- Apple finished the quarter in 5th place, declined over 11%, and was the only top 5 company to underperform the overall market.
Lenovo operates dual headquarters in Morrisville and Beijing.
