Journal Of Life: PC買氣比預期冷，PC 是否產生惡性質變，台灣 PC 廠要小心 ( PC market is freeze than expected cold, If PC happen with a vicious qualitative change, Taiwan PC industrial need to be careful )

個人電腦（PC）市場持續低迷不振，戴爾上季獲利大跌72%。
　戴爾業績報告如此慘澹，可能有利於創辦人暨執行長麥克．戴爾所堅持的提案－以每股13.75美元加上13美分股利，對戴爾而言是合乎公平的收購價格。

　戴爾第二財季營收為145億美元，與去年同期持平，且優於分析師預測均值142億美元。淨利年減逾70%，至2.04億美元，折合每股12美分；排除特定項目，每股盈餘為25美分，略高於市場預測均值24美分。

　毛利率較上一季下滑1個百分點，至19.6%。終端用戶電腦部門營收年減5%，至91億美元；企業解決方案、服務與軟體事業營收年增9%，至58億美元。

　分析師表示，當戴爾重視銷售量甚於獲利能力，利潤會被壓縮到這個程度並不令人意外。

　PC銷售仍占戴爾整體營收的一半，攸關公司的未來發展。市場研究公司CLSA預估，今年全球PC銷售量估將減少7%，明年再減4.5%。

Tablets Killing Desktops Faster Than Ever

The contraction of the PC market continues faster than ever, eaten by the rapid growth of the tablet market, which is expected to outsell laptop and notebook devices for the first time this year and all PCs by 2015. But portable PCs may still be the saving grace for PC sales in the years ahead.

If there is anything new about the news coming out from IDC's Quarterly PC Tracker, it's the increase of the rate of the PC's decline. IDC had initially predicted a decline of "1.3% in 2013 followed by a gradual increase in volume." Now the analyst firm is predicting a sharper decline of 7.8% in 2013 and 1.2% down in 2014.

2011 may have been the "peak PC" year, when 363 million units shipped. In 2012, 349 million units shipped, with only 321.9 units predicted for the 2013 calendar year. The market is expected to recover a little - by 2017, IDC estimates that 333 million will ship.

These numbers include shipments on both desktop and portable PCs, which is what IDC labels notebook and laptop PCs. That 2017 recovery will have no help from desktop PC sales: shipments are expected to drop from 148 million in 2012 to a predicted 134 million in 2013 and 124 million in 2017: a 16.5% contraction over five years.

Any recovery in the market will fall squarely within the portable PC sector: shipments were 201 million in 2012, and will be down to 187 million this year, but possibly up to 210 million in 2017, which is a net 4.3% uptick for the portable sector.

But where the real growth in portable devices is in the tablet sector. "T]ablet shipments are expected to grow 58.7% year-over-year in 2013 reaching 229.3 million units, up from 144.5 million units last year," [according to the press release, "IDC now predicts tablet shipments will exceed those of portable PCs this year.

"In addition, IDC expects tablet shipments to outpace the entire PC market (portables and desktops combined) by 2015," the company reported.

Tablets are not only going to be more prolific, they are going to be smaller. The IDC data is already seeing a sharp decrease in sales of tablets in the 8"-11" size range, and a healthy increase in tablets with less than 8 inches of screen size. As you can see in the table below, by 2017, 57% of tablets will be in that sub-8" range.

Worldwide Tablet Market Share by Screen Size Band, 2011 - 2017

Screen Size 2011 2013 2017
8" 27% 55% 57%
8" – 11" 73% 43% 37%
11"+ 0% 2% 6%
Total 100% 100% 100%

The shrinking of tablet size means that a lot less productivity will be getting done on these devices, as smaller tablets are very much consumption devices. This may explain the predicted increase of notebook sales: people will still want portability, but they also will need a platform on which to actually work.

As for the desktop PC, there looks to be no bright future in sight for the once-mighty platform. That which does not move, it seems, dies.

Gartner Says Worldwide PC, Tablet and Mobile Phone Shipments to Grow 5.9 Percent in 2013 as Anytime-Anywhere-Computing Drives Buyer Behavior

Traditional PC Shipments to Decline 10.6 Percent in 2013, While Tablet Shipments Increase 67.9 Percent

Worldwide devices (the combined shipments of PCs, tablets and mobile phones) are projected to reach 2.35 billion units in 2013, a 5.9 percent increase from 2012, according to Gartner, Inc. The market is being driven by sales in tablets, smartphones, and to a lesser extent, ultramobiles, as PC shipments are on the decline.

Worldwide traditional PC (desk-based and notebook) shipments are forecast to total 305 million units in 2013, a 10.6 percent decline from 2012 , while the PC market including ultramobiles is forecast to decline 7.3 percent in 2013 (see Table 1). Tablet shipments are expected to grow 67.9 percent, with shipments reaching 202 million units, while the mobile phone market will grow 4.3 percent, with volume of more than 1.8 billion units.

The sharp decline in PC sales recorded in the first quarter was the result in a change in preferences in consumers’ wants and needs, but also an adjustment in the channel to make room for new products hitting the market in the second half of 2013.

“Consumers want anytime-anywhere computing that allows them to consume and create content with ease, but also share and access that content from a different portfolio of products. Mobility is paramount in both mature and emerging markets,” said Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner.

Demand for ultramobiles (which includes Chromebooks, thin and light clamshell designs, and slate and hybrid devices running Windows 8) will come from upgrades of both notebooks and premium tablets, such as the Apple iPad or Galaxy Tab10.1. Analysts said ultramobile devices are gaining in attractiveness and drawing demand away from other devices. This will be even more evident in the fourth quarter of 2013 when the combination of new design based on Intel processors Bay Trail and Haswell running on Windows 8.1 will hit the market. Although these devices will only marginally help overall sales volumes initially, they are expected to help vendors increase average selling prices (ASPs) and margins.

The tablet and smartphone markets are facing some challenges as these devices gain longer life cycles. There has also been a shift as many consumers go from premium tablets to basic tablets. The share of basic tablets is expected to increase faster than anticipated, as sales of the iPad Mini already represented 60 percent of overall iOS tablet sales in the first quarter of 2013.

“The increased availability of lower priced basic tablets, plus the value add shifting to software rather than hardware will result in the lifetimes of premium tablets extending as they remain active in the household for longer. We will also see consumer preferences split between basic tablets and ultramobile devices,” said Ranjit Atwal, research director at Gartner. “With mobile phones, volume expectations for 2013 have been brought down as the life cycles lengthen as consumers wait for new models and lower prices to hit the market in the Fall and holiday season. The challenge in the smartphone market is also that, as penetration moves more and more to the mass market, price points are lowering and in most cases so do margins.”

“Although the numbers seem to paint a clear picture of who the winner will be when it comes to operating systems (OS) in the device market (see Table 2), the reality is that today ecosystem owners are challenged in having the same relevance in all segments,” said Ms. Milanesi. “Apple is currently the more homogeneous presence across all device segments, while 90 percent of Android sales are currently in the mobile phone market and 85 percent of Microsoft sales are in the PC market.”

Additionally, with enterprises’ growing acceptance of bring your own device (BYOD), there is an increase in consumer-owned devices in the computing world. Gartner forecasts that computing devices bought by consumers will grow from 65 percent in 2013 to 72 percent in 2017. This signifies the growing importance of designing for the consumer inside the enterprise.

有幾種情況，PC 產業會產生惡性質變：