SME boom drives up PC sales 30%

New Delhi: The Indian personal computer (PC) market has risen 30% in the financial year ended March 31, 2006, to surpass the 4.6 million-mark, riding the buoyant buying sentiment in the government and small and medium business segments, according to IDC’s India Quarterly PC Market Tracker, 1Q 2006.

In the overall client PC (sum of notebook PC and desktop PC) market, the rankings remained unchanged   Hewlett Packard retained the top slot with a market share of 18%, followed by HCL at 14% and Lenovo at 9% in terms of unit shipments.

In terms of total desktop PC shipments, HCL led the market in the financial year followed by HP and Lenovo, but with regard to total notebook PC shipments HP was the top vendor.

According to the IDC Market Tracker, commercial desktop shipments in Q1 2006 showed 14% sequential growth (Q1 2006 over Q4 2005) and a 16% year-on-year growth (Q1 2006 over Q1 2005).

This is the highest sequential growth seen in the Indian commercial desktop PC market in the previous eight quarters.

“For the corporate segment, it was business as usual but it was the government and medium business segments that contributed significantly to this performance,” said Piyush Pushkal of PC research, IDC India.

The notebook PC market zoomed ahead in Q1 2006 despite some uncertainties around the tax structure.