The Mac Observer

Skip navigational links

You're viewing an article in TMO's historic archive vault. Here, we've preserved the comments and how the site looked along with the article. Use this link to view the article on our current site:
Apple had 4.1% of Total Notebook Computer Market in 4Q06

Apple had 4.1% of Total Notebook Computer Market in 4Q06

by , 11:45 AM EDT, March 21st, 2007

Apple had 4.1 percent of the total notebook computer market sales by units for the 4th calendar quarter of 2006, placing them 9th overall. While the unit numbers were down compared to the previous quarter, 969,000 vs. 986,000 in Q3, the year over year sales were up dramatically, according to a report published by DisplaySearch*, Unit sales in 4Q05 were 587,000, so the year over year growth was 68 percent.

Sales data provided to The Mac Observer by John Jacobs, Director of Notebook Market Research, showed, however that the notebook market grew by 14 percent from Q3 2006 to Q4 2006, but Apple's sales declined slightly. There is a consideration that could cause this effect.

Mr. Jacobs told TMO that, historically, Apple customers pay close attention to Apple, its products, and rumor sites. They know that Macworld comes up in January and that typically slows down sales in the fourth calendar quarter in anticipation of new products.

"Even so," Mr. Jacobs said, "the halo effect doesn't seem to be happening. If it were a strong force, Apple's notebook sales should be increasing at the same rate as the market." In the short term, due to Apple's way of announcing new products, that may be true. But Apple's notebook sales, year over year, have, in fact, beaten the overall market growth by a wide margin, 68 percent compared to 28 percent.

Dell has had its share of troubles. Dell's notebook sales dropped from 3,573K units in Q3 to 3,517K units in Q4. Year over year sales increase was only about four percent. Hewlett-Packard, on the other hand, did extremely well in 2006. Their unit numbers for the four quarters of 2006 were: 2,981K, 2659K, 3624K, and 4689K units. Clearly, Hewlett Packard has become a force to contend with in notebook sales in the last year.

Here are the total sales by units for 4Q 2006:

  1. HP: 4689K
  2. Dell: 3517K
  3. Acer: 3104K
  4. Toshiba: 2299K
  5. Lenovo: 1975K
  6. Fujitsu-Siemens: 1247K
  7. Sony: 1177K
  8. Asus: 1040K
  9. Apple: 969K

"What Apple really wants to do now is see sustained incremetal growth in every quarter," Mr. Jacobs concluded.


* DisplaySearch is owned by NPD. Global sales numbers are voluntarily supplied by the vendors. The unit numbers here are for MacBook and MacBook Pro only.

Digg!

Observer Comments

Show: Subjects Only | Full Comments
Close Name:Terrin Posts: 414 Joined: 29 Jan 2006
Subject:

This report is relatively meaningless. First, HP, Dell, Acer, Toshiba, Lenovo, Fujitsu, Siemens and, I believe, Asus all compete in the cut throat low end computer market. For instance, Dell offers notebooks selling the much cheaper Celeron processor. Apple does not compete in that market at all. It offers no bargain bin computers using yesterday technology. Apple's market share should be compared only to markets it competes in.

Moreover, it is silly to say that there appears to be no Halo effect. Apple reports that roughly fifty percent of its buyers are new to the Mac. Moreover, its yearly unit sales keep increasing. That appears to be evidence of a Halo effect to me.

Close Name:Guest
Subject: A miscalculation leads to a numbers bump

Agreed. Oranges should be compared to oranges. In their niche, Apple does much better than these numbers. The number that is significant here is the 68% growth in laptop sales. While the other brands sold more, their numbers where flat, with many experiencing drops from previous quarters.

Want to guess where those numbers went? Apple sales invariably slump prior to the release of a revised OS. Watch the numbers go through the roof with the release of a new pro level CPU in the MacPro line married to Leopard's entrance onto the scene.

If Apple also gets a iPod out with that touch technology, numbers will even be higher due to crossover, "halo" related sales.

Comment on this Article


You cannot edit your comments.   You cannot delete your comments.

Comments are currently closed. Please email the author instead.


Recent Headlines - Updated July 6th

Mon, 5:28 PM
News - Arlington Police Release Video of Apple Store Shooter
4:40 PM
Deal Brothers - Apple Mac Pro 2.66GHz Intel Xeon Quad Core for $2,274.00 Delivered A/R
4:12 PM
Product News - Babylon Upgrade Adds New Translation Features to Mac Dictionary App
11:17 AM
Ted Landau's User Friendly View - Apple’s LED Cinema Display: A Too Short Story
11:11 AM
Product News - Photo Recovery for Mac Adds Photoshop Support
10:39 AM
Hot Forum Topic - iPhones in Education
8:47 AM
News - Apple Employee Injured in Store Shooting
Fri, 10:29 AM
News - Apple Warns of Learning Interchange Security Breach
7:30 AM
News - Happy Fourth of July!
Thu, 6:07 PM
TMO Scoop - Psystar Moves to Drop Bankruptcy Ahead of Apple Legal Battle
5:37 PM
News - Uncomfirmed Reports Say Apple & Nvidia On The Outs
4:57 PM
News - Microsoft Sick Over Barf Ad

The Mac Observer Reader Specials

  • __________
  • Buy Stuff, Support TMO!
  • Podcast: Mac Geek Gab
  • Podcast: Apple Weekly Report
  • TMO on Twitter!