Impacted by the global financial turmoil, monthly notebook PC shipments in the fourth quarter saw only a peak in October and then continued to 
decline in the following two months. Netbook (mini-note PC) shipments enjoyed growth in the fourth quarter, but not strong enough to push the overall market growth.

 

The production value of notebook PCs in the fourth quarter was US$17.58 billion, a 16% year-on-year (YoY) growth. The average selling price (ASP), however, was dragged down by the increasing netbook shipments to US$505 from US$513 in previous quarter.

 

The netbook remained a focus during the period as shipments already accounted for 18% of the overall notebook PC shipments. In addition to major and earlier players such as Asus' Eee PC and Acer's Aspire One, some other second-tier companies such as Micro-Star International Co. (MSI), Elitegroup Computer Systems Co., Ltd. (ECS) also enjoyed shipment growth of such product. That implies netbook is rapidly eating the share of conventional notebook PCs, the market research firm said.

 

Helen Chiang, research manager of PC & peripherals group, said, "netbook shipments in the fourth quarter continued to be strong but the final result still fell short of the original expectation." The analyst attributed the worse-than-expected result to demand shift to 10-inch models that pulled down shipments of 8.9-inch netbooks as well as the global downturn.

 

The analyst also noted that currency-exchange losses in emerging markets such as Russia, Brazil, and some Latin-American countries caused financial woes at local importers and distributors as well as various payment problems. Such development weakened the ODM (original developer manufacturer) shipments to some rising markets including the Eastern and Middle Europe, Latin America and other emerging markets. She said that such uncertainties might affect the overall market in the first quarter of 2009.