Apple's shipments plummet by 40%, PC makers struggle with Corona special demand cancellation

Apple PC shipments fell 40.5% in the first quarter. It's been a tough start to the year for PC makers with unsold inventories.

Combined shipments by all PC makers fell 29% to 56.9 million units, down from early 2019 levels, according to the latest report from IDC. Novel Coronavirus during the pandemic of remote work. It seems that the special demand has disappeared. Lenovo Group and Dell Technologies posted declines of more than 30%, while HP fell 24.2%. Huashun Dennou (Asus) was down 30.3%.

A slowdown in consumer spending over the past year has led to double-digit declines in smartphone shipments, piling up inventories among the world's largest memory chip suppliers. A South Korean company that supplies memory for mobile devices, desktop PCs and notebook PCs Samsung Electronics Last week, the company reported its lowest January-March profit since the global financial crisis in 2009 and also said it would cut production of memory semiconductors.

"Inventories have been declining in recent months but are well above the healthy 4-6 week range," said Jitesh Ubrani, research manager at IDC. "Despite heavy discounting," PC makers expect high inventories to persist into the middle of the year and likely into the third quarter. pointed out.

On the positive side, IDC said in a report that "many factories are beginning to explore production options outside of China" and that weaker demand is giving manufacturers "time and space" to make such changes. Apple sees U.S.-China tensions rising supply chain. It is gradually dispersing its manufacturing bases geographically because it threatens to disrupt production.

As for 2024, IDC researchers predict that demand for replacements of aging PCs and an improving global economy could help PC makers recover.

Original title: Apple's 40% Plunge Leads PC Shipments Down as Tech Demand Sags (excerpt)