While the global decline of the PC market is up for debate, it certainly looks to be true in East Africa.
According to market intelligence firm International Data Corporation (IDC), PC shipments to East Africa have declined 10.8% between 2013 and 2014. In total, almost 80 000 fewer PCs were shipped in Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, and Ethiopia.
IDC speculates that this is partly due to a number of manufacturers removing cheap mini notebooks from the market.
“While most market players experienced growing business across East Africa in 2014, the decision to end production of cheap mini notebooks pushed the overall numbers down,” says James Mutua, a research analyst at IDC East Africa, in a media statement.
“Compounding the departure of these popular devices was the fact that no obvious replacement product was immediately available. There is a clear need for a product that occupies the entry-level segment of the market, and we are yet to see whether Chromebooks or any other low-priced laptops will successfully take on the mantle vacated by the mini notebook form factor,” he added.
The decline was also spurred on by less small and medium-sized businesses purchasing portable computers. The commercial sector in the region made almost 10% less purchases year on year, while notebook shipments suffered the same fate due to the delay or postponement of various education projects.
However, it is not all doom and gloom, as desktop computers are pretty much still in demand in the region thanks to Microsoft.
“Shipments of desktop PCs to the commercial segment recorded positive growth in 2014 as enterprises sought to upgrade their old PCs as a result of Microsoft terminating support for Windows XP during the first half of the year,” the IDC said in a statement.
While sales are down, they likely won’t stay that way. There are a number of initiatives that still need to kick off in the region, most notably the One Laptop Per Child project in Kenya. If this successfully gets off the ground, 1.2 million notebooks will enter the market and arrive on the laps of students, significantly bolstering the figures.
[Source – IDC]
