Apple's holiday Mac shipments outpaced PC growth by largest margin in 5 years
While some pundits speculate that Mac lineup could be on the way out in favor of the iPad, Apple's traditional notebooks and desktops outpaced the overall PC market by nearly 25 percent last quarter, representing the largest margin separating the two in five years.
Apple's successful holiday quarter was highlighted this week by analyst Charlie Wolf with Needham & Company, who questioned whether the strong performance by the Mac is "a one-quarter blip" amidst a sinking PC market.
Mac shipments grew 18.1 percent in the December 2013 quarter, which outpaced the overall PC market by 24.7 percent. The year over year increase in Mac sales was a reversal for Apple, which has not been immune to consumer adoption of touchscreen tablets such as the iPad.
Overall PC shipments, which are dominated by Windows machines, have been shrinking year over year for the last seven quarters. Apple has also seen its Mac shipments decline in some quarters, but the company has still gained market share vs. Windows PCs in all quarters since 2005 but one.
The Mac's unit share of the worldwide PC market has grown from 2.1 percent in 2005 to 5.5 percent in 2013. Apple's revenue share growth has been even greater, surging from 3.2 percent to 10.4 percent.
As for Apple's particularly strong growth in the December quarter, where it posted sales of 4.8 million units, that was aided by a favorable year-over-year comparison: In the same period in 2012, Apple faced a severe shortage of its redesigned iMac, which limited Mac shipments in the quarter. That ended up being the lone quarter where PC shipments outgrew the Mac.
"The question we don't have an answer to is whether Mac shipment growth can overcome the headwinds of negative growth in PC shipments," Wolf wrote. "While the Mac represents a small fraction of Apple's revenues, it nonetheless is an important barometer of the health of Apple's ecosystem."
Wolf believes that tablets have "undoubtedly" cut into PC sales, though he questions the "magnitude of this effect" so far. He suggested that sales of the iPad might adversely affect Mac sales more than traditional Windows PCs.
"Shoppers at the Apple Stores most likely consider both a MacBook and an iPad for their next purchase," he said. "The allure of an iPad is undoubtedly far greater when it is in close proximity to a MacBook than it is in other shopping venues."
In a separate note issued earlier this month, Wolf detailed how Apple has held the Mac's average selling price steady at $1,300, even as overall PC prices have trended downward with the popularity of netbooks, and later tablets. The steady pricing helps to explain how Apple's dollar share of the PC market has outgrown its market share over the last decade.
Apple's successful holiday quarter was highlighted this week by analyst Charlie Wolf with Needham & Company, who questioned whether the strong performance by the Mac is "a one-quarter blip" amidst a sinking PC market.
Mac shipments grew 18.1 percent in the December 2013 quarter, which outpaced the overall PC market by 24.7 percent. The year over year increase in Mac sales was a reversal for Apple, which has not been immune to consumer adoption of touchscreen tablets such as the iPad.
Overall PC shipments, which are dominated by Windows machines, have been shrinking year over year for the last seven quarters. Apple has also seen its Mac shipments decline in some quarters, but the company has still gained market share vs. Windows PCs in all quarters since 2005 but one.
The Mac's unit share of the worldwide PC market has grown from 2.1 percent in 2005 to 5.5 percent in 2013. Apple's revenue share growth has been even greater, surging from 3.2 percent to 10.4 percent.
As for Apple's particularly strong growth in the December quarter, where it posted sales of 4.8 million units, that was aided by a favorable year-over-year comparison: In the same period in 2012, Apple faced a severe shortage of its redesigned iMac, which limited Mac shipments in the quarter. That ended up being the lone quarter where PC shipments outgrew the Mac.
"The question we don't have an answer to is whether Mac shipment growth can overcome the headwinds of negative growth in PC shipments," Wolf wrote. "While the Mac represents a small fraction of Apple's revenues, it nonetheless is an important barometer of the health of Apple's ecosystem."
Wolf believes that tablets have "undoubtedly" cut into PC sales, though he questions the "magnitude of this effect" so far. He suggested that sales of the iPad might adversely affect Mac sales more than traditional Windows PCs.
"Shoppers at the Apple Stores most likely consider both a MacBook and an iPad for their next purchase," he said. "The allure of an iPad is undoubtedly far greater when it is in close proximity to a MacBook than it is in other shopping venues."
In a separate note issued earlier this month, Wolf detailed how Apple has held the Mac's average selling price steady at $1,300, even as overall PC prices have trended downward with the popularity of netbooks, and later tablets. The steady pricing helps to explain how Apple's dollar share of the PC market has outgrown its market share over the last decade.
Comments
I never trust analysts. They just rely on guesswork.
Either way, Apple is doomed. I haven't seen any signs of doomness, but Apple is still doomed somehow.
I am very happy Macs are still selling into every market although I wish they were selling more into the government (one of the largest continuous buyers of PCs).
1. Apple is doomed.
2. Bad news for others is actually worse news for Apple
3. Good news for Apple is actually bad news
4. Only Apple needs revolutionary products
5. Apple must maintain margins AND sell no-profit phones.
Most businesses that have 'We only allow PCs in our corporate fiefdom' are moving to 'Our apps are in the cloud' in either a true web app, or in a Virtual Desktop Instance (VDI). As Business move understand the cost of provisioning PC hardware is crazy expensive, they will stipend their worker bees to get their own laptops. Most will be program discounts at dell, hp, or lenovo... but some people will buy Macs.
In the end... Only the corporate elite, and the critical few power users [Real power users will have an AWS farm at their disposal, gone is the day where I need a 16core processor on my desk, when I can buy 128 cores the 3 days a month when I need them... a Macbook Pro and a couple TB screens is all I need to do my job from work and home] will have corporate owned hardware... and even there, the Mac Pro and the iPad Air will carve into PC sales.
[disclaimer... I work in corporate consulting focusing on transformation of IT into a secure, fully extensible model... part of what I say may be marketing;-)]
For corporations and for most home users, isn't it about dollars and cents. Corporations look at the laptop or computer as a tool to produce work (i.e. spreadsheets, docs, etc.) They want a reliable platform to do that work. They don't see the return for the additional cost of a Mac. It is that simple. We tried some Apple products at our corporation. The results were a lot of extra cost on monitors and devices and productivity no different. In fact, many people used the iPads for virtual desktops for Windows. If money is no object, Apple products are fun and useful!!!
I never trust analysts. They just rely on guesswork.
And you make this brilliant comment on what authority and what proof to substantiate it?
Analysts are always wrong.
Then how does he explain the decline in PC sales?
I would argue that PC sales are declining due to the rise of tablets AND smartphones. BOTH these devices are used for stuff that could be done previously only on desktop hardware.
It's analysis which is using historical models and there are estimates so there is a margin of error but it's not guessing.
"Apple's successful holiday quarter was highlighted this week by analyst Charlie Wolf with Needham & Company, who questioned whether the strong performance by the Mac is "a one-quarter blip" amidst a sinking PC market."
Successful holiday quarter? Wait a minute, Charlie%u2026I thought Apple had a disappointing holiday quarter and didn't meet the "inflated" expectations by you and your manipulating cohorts?
Just answered your own question, I guess.
Yes, those Dell cr*pbooks compare much more favorably to an iPad at Best Buy than MacBook Airs at the Apple Store. How do these "analysts" even stay employed?
That's really scary if they are using Lotus 1-2-3.
In this context they aren't the same.
As for the historical data we're talking about maths here. Graphing a chart that shows a pattern and predicts a model doesn't say you're beholden to that prediction as fact but simply that the pattern shows a particular sequence. That sequence is always subject to change when new data (i.e.: facts) are presented but you can't simply say that these mathematical models are simply guesswork because it's not accurate.
It's an educated guess but it's still a guess.
I never trust analysts. They just rely on guesswork.
What would you prefer they rely on, a crystal ball?
Any predictions for the future will rely on a fair bit of guesswork. It's the quality of the information used to backup the guesswork, and the shrewdness of the analyst that makes the difference.
1) Qualifying the word guess with educated changes the meaning from simply calling a guess.
2) In finance terms like guess, estimate and predictive modeling are not interchange. One can't say that graphing historical data then drawing a line to show change into the future is a guess, educated or not, because at that point you haven't made any guesses, you've only extrapolated the facts to determine probability.
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