NEWS

Device shipments worldwide to increase 2.0% in 2018: Gartner

By VARINDIA - 2017-10-18

Worldwide shipments of PCs, tablets and smartphones are predicted to exceed 2.35 billion units in 2018, an increase of 2.0% from 2017, according to Gartner. This would be the highest year-over-year growth since 2015.

The misconception persists that the world has gone mobile and relies solely on smartphones. "However, our latest online end-user survey shows that users depend just as much on PCs or tablets as they do on smartphones," said Ranjit Atwal, Research Director, Gartner. "40% of respondents said that they use mostly a PC/tablet for certain daily experiences, such as reading and writing detailed emails or watching videos, while 34% mostly use a smartphone for its convenience while on the move."

Traditional PC shipments are forecast to decline 4.4% in 2018 while mobile phone shipments are expected to increase 2.4% (see Table 1):

Worldwide Device Shipments by Device Type, 2016-2019 (Millions of Units)

Device Type 2016 2017 2018 2019

Traditional PCs (Desk-Based and Notebook) 220 204 195 188

Ultramobiles (Premium) 50 59 70 81

Total PC Market 270 263 265 269

Ultramobiles (Basic and Utility) 169 162 161 160

Computing Device Market 439 425 426 429

Mobile Phones 1,893 1,882 1,926 1,932

Total Device Market 2,332 2,307 2,352 2,361

This upward trend is assisted by two factors. The PC market in Russia has been positively influenced by an upturn in the country's economic prospects, which has seen business spending on PCs increase by 5% in 2017. This growth will persist into 2018. Spending is primarily focussed on desktop PCs, which are more aggressively priced than mobile PCs or hybrid devices.

The second factor is China, where the move to Windows 10 has been delayed due to security and privacy issues, leading to slow PC sales in 2017. However, Microsoft is now working with a Chinese government agency to develop a government-approved version.

On the other side, Mobile phone sales are expected to return to year-over-year growth in 2018, with shipments totalling 1.9 billion units. Smartphones will represent 86% of total mobile phone shipments in 2018, 6% up from 2017.

Speaking on this, Gartner Research Director Roberta Cozza says, “We expect Apple's iPhone X to be the sales driver in North America, China and Western Europe, despite its high price.” Given the late November availability of the iPhone X, we expect the iPhone's replacement cycle to flow more strongly into 2018."

Component shortages could lead to the inability to meet smartphone demand in the fourth quarter of 2017, further favouring unit sales moving into 2018. For this segment, local vendors continue to struggle against the shift toward top brands, while component price increases affect the ability of some Android vendors to compete more aggressively on price. While this is expecting to limit Smartphone growth in 2017, the 2018 growth rate is accordingly estimated to be higher than previously forecast.