There has been an 8.8% shrinkage in Middle East and Africa’s (MEA) personal computing devices (PCD) market due to the reduction in demand for desktops and tablet devices according to the recently released International Data Corporation’s (IDC) Quarterly PCD Tracker for Q1 of 2017.
According to the report, PCD shipments reduced to about 6 million units which represent the lowest since Q4 of 2011 and it is linked to the fall in demand for traditional desktops and slate tablets to fell 25.3 percent and 16.9 percent respectively.
According to the report, detachable tablets however grew by 102.5 percent over the same period while notebook shipments increased by 5.9 percent year on year in unit terms.
Commenting on the development, Fouad Charakla, senior research manager for client devices at IDC MEA, said: “The overall economic slowdown in most parts of the region has been a key inhibitor of the PCD market’s performance.”
According to him, demand for slate tablets continues to be cannibalised by the increasing shift among home users to the use of smartphones for tasks previously performed on tablets.
Regading tablets, Samsung is still the leader in terms of market share in Q1, while Apple and Huawei remained second and third respectively. The top five vendor rankings for the quarter were rounded out by Lenovo and UAE-based vendor i-life.
IDC predicted that the MEA PCD market will continue to suffer a year-on-year decline of 8.2 percent for 2017 as a whole.
“This will correspond to a total of 24 million shipments for the year, which is the lowest annual volumes recorded since 2011,” IDC stated.
