Worldwide Printer Market declines 4% in Q1, 2019

Worldwide shipments of hardcopy peripherals (HCP) or printers decreased 3.9% year over year to 22.8 million units in the first quarter of 2019 (1Q19), according to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Hardcopy Peripherals Tracker. The brightest spot for the quarter was the year-over-year expansion of color inkjet multifunction printers (MFPs) in the 11-20 ppm range, which grew 4.7% to more than 6.2 million units shipped.

Ink Tank devices continued their positive momentum recording a 23.4% year-over-year gain in unit shipments in 1Q19. Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) and Latin America were the top two regions for ink tank shipments with 1.7 and 1.0 million units shipped in the quarter, respectively.

Inkjet shipments decreased 2.1% year over year to nearly 13.7 million units shipped. Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) was the top region for inkjet shipments, growing 8.8% year over year to more than 3.5 million units in 1Q19. Western Europe, the second largest market, contracted 5.4% while the United States, the third largest market, declined 4.8% year over year.

A3 color laser MFPs continued on a positive trajectory with a year-over-year gain of 1.0% to nearly 600,000 units shipped.

HP Inc. declined 3.5% year over year with global shipments dropping to less than 9.4 million units. However, two of HP's top 3 regions, Western Europe and the U.S., exhibited year-over-year gains of 2.8% and 2.6%, respectively.

Epson regained the top inkjet position from Canon in Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) albeit at a marginal share advantage of 0.7%. Epson grew by about 210,000 units year over year due to the improved sales of its new generation of more compact ink tank printers, which were largely responsible for the growth of the ASEAN market and the biggest winner in China as the only one with a market share gain this quarter.