PDA Shipments Drop 5.3%, HP Experiences Explosive Growth

[Ed Hansberry]

<a href="http://www.infosyncworld.com/news/n/4550.html">http://www.infosyncworld.com/news/n/4550.html</a><br /><br />"Gartner congratulated Hewlett-Packard for its wide range of new models in 2003, and palmOne for its successful Tungsten T3. However, it noted that the majority of demand lay with low-end models, perhaps due to price-pressure from Dell and other vendors. palmOne's market share slipped from 54.8% in 2002 to just 43.4% in 2003, marking the biggest decline in numbers. After RIM, Dell and HP posted the strongest growth."<br /><br />Other <a href="http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jhtml?containerId=pr2004_01_26_203742">reports from IDC</a> show HP growing 101.5% over 2002 on the success of their new iPAQ lines. Remember that most of the new devices weren't available until July or even later after the June release of Windows Mobile 2003.

[Stik]

Personally, I think Gartner adding Rim devices as PDA's skews the numbers of ' true ' handhelds sold worldwide in 2003.

Take RIM out of the equation, and it seems IDC's numbers paint a clearer ( and not so pretty ) picture of whats actually happened to the handheld market in 2003.

Oh well. If handheld ( PPC ) manufacturers don't mass market advertise their handheld products, what else could one expect? :roll:

[Ed@Brighthand]

I found it interesting how statistics can sometimes be used to prove people's pre-assumptions. After the IDC report came out, there were articles called things like "Handheld Sales Drop Radically", while others said, "Handheld Sales Up". This is because sales of handhelds were up in the second half of the year, but sales the first half of the year were really weak, bringing the total down. In my opinion, sales turned a corner this summer, and we'll see growth for all of 2004.

BTW, congrats to HP for having such a great year!

[Stik]

IMO, Ed@ Brighthand makes a right on assesment. His thoughts coupled W/ Ed Hansberry's ( 2 ed's can be better than one! Sorry, couldn't resist :oops: ) comment of...

"Remember that most of the new devices weren't available until July or even later after the June release of Windows Mobile 2003."

...are solid and valid.

It makes sense that the first half of 2003 was weak due to current users waiting on the release of WM2003 and new models. Hence, an excellent 2nd half of the year for sales.

Herein lies the problem ( ? ) IMO.

How much of the second half surge was stimulated by older model unit users upgrading?

How many new PDA users?

The only comment of Ed@ Brighthand I might quibble with is...

" we'll see growth for all of 2004. "

I think this will depend on...

Advertising & Marketing dollars spent... or not. :soapbox: :wink:

[Ed Hansberry]

Ed Hardy makes a good point. As I recall, Q1 and Q2 for 2003 were pretty bad. Q3 was better but Q4 was fantastic. IMHO, worst case scenario for 2004 barring a sudden economic turn is 2004 is flat and could well be up a bit.

Of course, Windows Mobile will be reap the benefits. :wink: :lol:

[scmok]

I found it interesting how statistics can sometimes be used to prove people's pre-assumptions. After the IDC report came out, there were articles called things like "Handheld Sales Drop Radically", while others said, "Handheld Sales Up". This is because sales of handhelds were up in the second half of the year, but sales the first half of the year were really weak, bringing the total down. In my opinion, sales turned a corner this summer, and we'll see growth for all of 2004.

BTW, congrats to HP for having such a great year!


The figures of IDC press release is very scattered which maybe the source of confusion rather than presumptions or intention of people :

Slight Quarterly Growth in Worldwide Handheld Devices Market, But Full-Year Decline of 18%,

On the strength of the newly released Zire 21, Tungsten E, and Tungsten T3 handhelds, palmOne posted sequential growth of 56.7% and a corresponding increase in market share from 37.5% to 38.5%.

HP's market share declined from 25.9% in the previous quarter to 25.1% in 4Q03 due to a significantly larger market,

The fourth quarter saw the introduction of Dell's new Axim X3 line of devices, pushing Dell up 21% sequentially and 167.4% year-over-year.

It first appears that HP is thriving while others experience sales drop. But actually everybody sees tremendous growth in Q42003 but Dell has a greater quarter than HP, than SONY than PalmOne.

HP doesn't has a great year as its market share actually declines 0.8% in a market that shrinks 18% for the whole year while Palm suffers the most.


But still even I try to be objective, I am not sure theabove is the correct conclusion. The IDC report has so much info. missing that it is hard to have apple-to-apple comparison. Maybe the paid subscription is different. :roll: As an after thought, maybe everybody is doing great since the models last year are much more expensive than the basic models in 2002 that PalmOne sold.

Seems the actual winner is not shown here. Smart mobile phones are thriving even more significantly. Oh, that's only my speculation. No figures. :wink:

SC Mok