Gartner: 1 Billion PCs In Use (and counting...)

[MacRumors]

Gartner has announced that more than 1 billion personal computers are in use worldwide, and the number should double by 2014 driven largely by emerging market sales.

"Mature markets such as the United States, Western Europe, and Japan currently account for 58 percent of the world’s installed PCs, but these markets only account for 15 percent of the world’s population," said George Shiffler, research director at Gartner. "There's a startling difference in per capita PC penetration between mature and emerging markets. Of course, much of this difference reflects the disparity in average living standards between mature and emerging markets. But, rapid economic development across emerging markets is not only narrowing the disparity in average living standards, it's closing the difference in per capita PC penetration between mature and emerging markets."

"We expect per capita PC penetration in emerging markets to double by 2013," added Mr. Shiffler. "Rapid penetration in emerging markets is being driven by the explosive expansion of broadband and wireless connectivity in these markets, the continuing fall in PC average selling prices (ASPs), and the general realization that PCs are an indispensable tool for advancement."

Apple has recently done very well in the United States, experiencing some of the highest growth rates in the industry.

International sales have typically consisted of 40-50% of Apple's revenue, and Apple specifically noted that they were experiencing marketshare growth in virtually all European and Asian countries during their 1Q 2008 conference call.

Article Link

[longofest]

Tried to get some more detailed info on how Apple is doing in "emerging markets." My guess is that Apple actually isn't doing as well as others are because they don't do cheap stuff. However, as long as they're able to expand in pretty saturated markets like US and Europe and NE Asia, they'll be fine for the time being.

[killerrobot]

I have more computers NOT in use than I have computers in use. Now world numbers for that would be something really interesting to figure out.

[clevin]

i tried to get a number of macs among these 1b computers, sorry no data available...... anybody has any?

[Eraserhead]

Originally Posted by clevin

i tried to get a number of macs among these 1b computers, sorry no data available...... anybody has any?

I think its around 25 to 30 million.

Originally Posted by Ugg

For them to ignore China, India and Brazil would be suicide.

In the long term yes, but in the near term its not worth targeting them, they aren't able to afford expensive hardware and they generally can't afford software so they pirate it.

There is no money to be made there at the moment.

[Ugg]

Originally Posted by Eraserhead

I
In the long term yes, but in the near term its not worth targeting them, they aren't able to afford expensive hardware and they generally can't afford software so they pirate it.

There is no money to be made there at the moment.

Brazil, India and China have extremely fast growing middle classes. Broadband connections in China will outpace broadband connections in the US by the end of this year.

While it's true that the vast majority of the citizens don't have much money if even only 5% of the populations of India and China can afford a Mac, that's a potential market of well over 100 million people.

IMO, and the opinion of many other businesses, ignoring China and India is suicidal.

Apple needs to have a game plan for emerging markets, especially since population growth in Japan, North America and Europe is levelling off.

[jodelli]

Originally Posted by Eraserhead

In the long term yes, but in the near term its not worth targeting them, they aren't able to afford expensive hardware and they generally can't afford software so they pirate it.

There is no money to be made there at the moment.

Yeah but according to
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/english...ent_386060.htm :
"The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) released a report earlier this year that suggested China's "middle class" accounted for 19 per cent of the country's 1.3 billion population by 2003."
That's 250 million people.

And from
http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0102/p01s02-woap.html :
"Although Chinese economic output has been growing by around 10 percent a year, domestic consumption has grown much more slowly; in fact consumption's share of GDP has fallen from 47 percent to 37 percent over the last decade."


GDP figure based on official exchange rate: 3.251 trillion (2007 est.) That would put the consumption figure around $1.2 trillion.
GDP figure based on purchasing power parity: $6.991 trillion (2007 est.) That would put the consumption figure around $2.6 trillion.
Pick which figure Apple prefers to sneeze at.

GDPs from:
https://www.cia.gov/library/publicat...k/geos/ch.html

[mixel]

I dont see why a company should have to cater to all markets to be succesful or profitable, where's the logic in that? Apple could continue to do fine without expanding into emerging markets, surely?

[Ugg]

Originally Posted by longofest

Tried to get some more detailed info on how Apple is doing in "emerging markets." My guess is that Apple actually isn't doing as well as others are because they don't do cheap stuff. However, as long as they're able to expand in pretty saturated markets like US and Europe and NE Asia, they'll be fine for the time being.

For them to ignore China, India and Brazil would be suicide.

They've got to have a plan and it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

[bigmc6000]

Originally Posted by Ugg

For them to ignore China, India and Brazil would be suicide.

They've got to have a plan and it will be interesting to see how it plays out.

Apple's plan: Hope the dollar continues to go in the *****ter thus making it a bit cheaper to sell stuff over seas. If the dollar becomes strong again you can kiss any headway into those markets goodbye...

[hob]

Longofest, the quote says "by 2013" but your article says "by 2014"... which I guess is pretty much true, but it seems silly to have different dates in the same article, no?

[Coprolite]

Apple can just keep on doing what it is doing. In SE Asia, Macs are viewed as status symbols and are priced accordingly. I am writing this from a Thai MB. Apple will have plenty of hardware market share.

As for the remark about hoping the dollar keeps going down....I am little confused by the logic, the machines are sourced and manufactured in China. The dollar strength or weakness wouldn't really impact profits in China/India as the Macs are actually local products. The Chinese Yuan was still pegged to the dollar last time I checked....

[Eraserhead]

Originally Posted by longofest

Tried to get some more detailed info on how Apple is doing in "emerging markets." My guess is that Apple actually isn't doing as well as others are because they don't do cheap stuff.

FWIW I looked up some figures for eastern Europe recently to compare them to Linux and Apple had around a 0.4% share there, which was generally lower than Linux's 0.5% share.

[twoodcc]

dang, double by 2014?