IDC estimates that global PC shipments fell 2.4% yr/yr in Q4 to 80.8 million - a bigger decline than Q3 and Q2's 1.7%, but better than its expectations for a 4.8% drop. Gartner is more positive, estimating shipments rose 1% to 83.7 million.
Both analysts say that emerging markets, where tablet cannibalisation remains a major issue, remain in worse shape than developed markets. IDC also says that commercial PC demand (boosted earlier this year by the ending of Windows XP support) has slowed, and that "market progress has been fueled by low-priced systems, including growth of Chromebooks and [Microsoft's] promotion of Windows 8 + Bing.
The US consumer market is expected to return to positive growth in 2015, aided by slowing tablet demand and the Windows 10 launch. IDC believes all top-5 vendors gained share from rivals with less size. A quarter after cracking the top 5 for the first time with a 6.3% share, Apple's unit share is believed to have risen to 7.1% (+130 bps yr/yr) on the back of 4.9 million shipments (+18.9%). Given higher ASPs, revenue share might be around 15%.
Market leader Lenovo's share rose 140 bps to 19.9%; #2 HP's rose 300 bps to 19.7%; #3 Dell's rose 140 bps to 13.5%; #4 Acer's rose 40 bps to 7.7%. Non-top 5 firms saw their share drop 740 bps to 32.2%, with their shipments declining 20.7%. We await Intel's results later this week, with interest.