Improving Emea PC shipments Show Strongest Growth In Two Years 

The PC market in Emea has picked up at last after seven quarters of falling sales and one of mild growth, according to figures from Context. The UK saw a big leap of almost 24 percent.

With unit sales growing overall across Emea by 15.6 percent in the second quarter of this year, the analyst company confirmed that this was the biggest growth since the second quarter of 2012.

XP reaction

Rather than signalling a disillusionment with tablets, the increase in sales follows the end of Windows XP support and other refreshes from companies that have squeezed as much use out of their current laptops and desktops as they possibly could.

A small indicator of the change came during Q1 of this year when Context reported a seven percent upturn but the doubling of this growth in the following quarter hides some even more impressive results from Western European countries. Germany, in particular, seems to have boosted the overall growth with an increase of 48.5 percent, compared with the UK’s 24.8 percent and France’s 13.7 percent.

Politics has intervened in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) with the escalation of the situation between Russia and Ukraine leading to disruption and economic sanctions. Despite Czech Republic and Poland both showing double digit growth, the negative performance of their neighbours has dragged the figures into a shrinkage of the PC market by 8.4 percent.

In a report covering ongoing research in the workstation market last month, Context found that growth had boomed in Emea and shown a 39.8 percent growth in the first 11 weeks of the second quarter compared with the equivalent Q2 period of 2013.

Marie-Christine Pygott, senior analyst at Context, said, “Sales were driven by XP migration projects, the need for product refreshes and an improving economic situation in some of the Western European countries.”