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Widescreens Become The Norm |
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Written by Adam Gosling
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Wednesday, 22 November 2006 |
The migration to widescreen LCD displays in the notebook
market is all but complete with the format achieving a 79 per cent share of the
market, according to DisplaySearch.
Standard 4:3 ratio displays now have only a 21 per cent
share thanks to a couple of hold out geographies, notably Japan where wide
aspect screens account for only 52 per cent of unit shipments in the third quarter.
These discrepancies are not expected to last long with
DisplaySearch predicting that panel makers are actively scaling back output of
standard aspect notebook PC panels.
The popularisation of wide aspect screens has less to do
with watching DVDs as it does the economics of panel production, with wider
screens offering better efficiencies and cost structure.
While there is price parity in the market between the two
aspects, DisplaySearch says system builders are likely to see an end to this
option as production of standard format screens winds down raising prices.
The researcher points out that other reasons there are
regional differences in the take up of widescreen laptops actually relates to
the size of screens preferred, with the Asia regions looking for smaller
screens than the northern hemisphere and brand differentials.
Lenovo's ThinkPad brand is the last major notebook PC brand
to begin shipping wide aspect products, with the company only shipping 13
percent of its laptops with widescreen, compared to, say HPO which had 76 per
cent of its sales in the wide aspect format, or Acer with 98%.
John Jacobs, Director of Notebook Market Research at
DisplaySearch explains; "For a long time, many brands promoted wide as a
differentiating factor, and charged a premium for these products, even after
panel prices between comparable wide and standard aspect panels disappeared.
"Brands that were hungry for market share were quick to drop
the street price premium, even running "free upgrade" promotions
encouraging customers to make the transition.
"Additionally, brands with a heavier reliance on the
enterprise market faced the additional hurdle of convincing IT managers to
embrace wide products and support additional configurations," he said.
The report also has marketshare information for the major
vendors with the company offering up this sample. In particular DisplaySearch
notes that Hewlett Packard experienced "amazing 36% Q/Q growth", which was
double the market rate and pushed them past Dell in the rankings.
HP achieved the top spot in the worldwide notebook PC market
last Quarter as Dell slowed considerably.
Acer was another standout performer pushing past Toshiba to
re-take the third-ranked spot.
Brand Market Share Rank
by Region
Rank
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Japan
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North America
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EMEA
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Greater China
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Latin America
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APAC
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1
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Fujitsu/ Fujitsu- Siemens
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Dell
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Acer
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Lenovo
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HP
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HP
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2
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Toshiba
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HP
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HP
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Dell
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Dell
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Acer
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3
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NEC
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Toshiba
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Dell
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Acer
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Sony
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Dell
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4
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Lenovo
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Apple
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Toshiba
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Asus
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Lenovo
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Toshiba
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5
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Dell
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Lenovo
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Fujitsu/ Fujitsu- Siemens
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Toshiba
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Gateway
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Asus
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Note: HP does not separate Greater China and Japan
from APAC, but groups all three together.
Q3'06 Worldwide Notebook Shipment Market Share
Rank
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Brand
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Q3'06 Unit Share
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Q/Q Growth
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1
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HP
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20.1%
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36.3%
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2
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Dell
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19.9%
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13.9%
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3
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Acer
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13.4%
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28.1%
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4
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Toshiba
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12.2%
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4.6%
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5
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Lenovo
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9.3%
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22.7%
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Looking ahead the end of year sales are likely to further favour wide aspect notebooks as consumers increase their share of the buyers and and enterprise customers typically slow their purchases.
www.displaysearch.com
Or here
for the report
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