Betting On A Windows 11 Hardware Refresh Was Unwise
The Register has news on the overall PC purchases and shipping for the latest quarter and it is not wonderful. Indeed it hasn’t been this bad since the 90’s; thankfully adjusted numbers and not less actual sales. It has been a rough four quarters for everyone but Apple, and that is only because their sales have slowed by a lesser margin than the competition. The supply chain bottlenecks may have been mostly resolved, but that has not been enough to help.
According to IDC, the market shrunk by 19.5% compared to this time last year, which was not exactly an awesome quarter by any means. IDC figures a total of 68 million computers were sent into the channel, and Canalys more or less agrees with their estimates being a 18% decline with 69.4 million PCs shipped. This will definitely have an effect on all companies bottom line, with AMD suggesting their sales may be $1.1 billion under expectation which is a fair chunk of last quarters $6.5 billion.
A part of this issue is the utter lack of interest in Windows 11 shown by businesses, and a lukewarm reception by consumers. A recent study found that just over half of the PCs currently being used have the hardware to support Windows 11 and with the current economic conditions that is unlikely to change quickly. There is hope that many of these systems only have a year or so of reliable operation, but Q2/Q3 2023 is a long way off.
