The global PC monitor market continued to decline in the fourth quarter of 2021 with unit shipments shrinking 5.2 per ent compared to the same quarter in 2020.
According to IDC beancounters, the market still exceeded expectations and ended 2021 with a five percent year on year growth rate. With 143.6 million units shipped globally, 2021 also stood as the best performing year since 2012, when the volume was 150.3 million.
The research firm’s data also showed that a weaker H2 2021 brought down the strong momentum of the first half, which had an impressive year on year growth rate of 19.4 percent.
IDC added that challenges seen in Q3 persisted in the holiday quarter. Although mature regions slowed, volume was supported by emerging markets catching up on backlogs while global commercial volume helped to offset a softer consumer base.
Research manager for IDC’s Worldwide Client Devices Trackers, Jay Chou said: “Whether it was businesses refreshing PCs and monitors as they moved towards Windows 10 or the pandemic pivot towards work from home, these developments gave a much-needed boost to what had been a staid industry. However, we now see growing saturation, inflationary pressures from the pandemic and the Ukrainian crisis further accelerating an already cooling environment in 2022, when we expect monitor shipments to shrink 3.6 percent and then stabilise after.”
Dell and Lenovo were the only two vendors to experience growth in the fourth quarter because they had better control of their supply chain or a stronger presence in emerging markets.
Dell and Lenovo both outgrew the market and registered upper single-digit growth.
Lenovo also overtook HP as the number two vendor for the quarter.
