PC shipments dip over 25 pc in region

ALKESH SHARMA / Emirates Business

Facing a tough competition from smart-phones and tablets, the personal computer (PC) industry has witnessed a sharp plunge in the shipments coming to this region. Besides mounting competition, market pundits also attribute this dive to less tourist arrivals, and diminishing confidence of customers. These were pegged as major drivers leading to the industry decline.
“Smart-phone industry is growing very fast in the UAE and Middle East region. When compared with PCs, they are economical, handy and support majority of the applications. Therefore more consumers are preferring to purchase an AED200 to AED300 worth smart-phone instead of spending more amounts on PC systems,” Akshay Makhani, a technology researcher and consultant with a Dubai-based consultancy firm, told Emirates Business.
“UAE is home to large number of youngsters, who are most of the times connected with internet and prefer to browse only through their smart-phones or tablets. Even the local vendors are also experiencing the same trend where people are going for smart-phones instead of PCs. Therefore this market is bound to see a further plummet in PC industry in the coming months,” added Makhani.
In one of its recent report, International Data Corporation (IDC), a global technology research and consulting firm, says that the Middle East and Africa (MEA) PC market underwent a 25.9 percent year-on-year decline in shipments in the first quarter of 2016. The shipments to this region dipped for the fourth consecutive quarter, to total of around 3.2 million units.
“Reasons differ from country to country, but slowdowns in tourist spending, lower consumer confidence resulting from low oil prices and currency devaluations have all played a part in the regional contraction. The ongoing shift in end-user spending towards smartphones and, to a lesser extent, tablets in the consumer segment was also a key element in the market’s decline,” said Fouad Charakla, Senior Research Manager — personal computing, systems, and infrastructure solutions — IDC Middle East, Africa, and Turkey.
“In the longer term, the PC market is expected to recover to some extent in 2017, with modest growth anticipated in the following years.
“Shipments to Africa are expected to grow slightly faster than shipments to the Middle East,” stated Charakla.
IDC report also mentioned that
the notebooks recorded a 28.7
percent decline in shipments to total 1.9 million units, whereas desktop shipments registered a comparatively slower decline, falling by 21.4 percent year-on-year to total 1.3
million units.
Farhan Akhtar (35), who works with an aviation solutions company in Abu Dhabi, told Emirates Business, “Till date I haven’t used the PC. Initially I was using a laptop, then I switched to tablet and now I am using a wide-screen smart-phone. Its operating system is much faster than any PC and I am a big fan of it. It gives me a freedom to browse from anywhere on the earth and also saves me from the need to carry an extra bag.”