IDC sees slower PC demand in the Philippines

THE INTERNATIONAL Development Corp. (IDC) forecasts slower demand for personal computers in the Philippines this year amid a supply shortage in Intel’s computer processing units.

“If you look at the PC market results for 2018, you can actually see that the PC market is very, very strong. There are actually several big projects. Therefore in 2019, we do not expect these big projects to be repeated,” Maciek Gornicki, research manager of IDC’s Asia/ Pacific Client Devices Group, told reporters at an Acer press conference on Tuesday.

“We would expect the decline in commercial space. On top of that, the market is impacted by the supply constraints of processors and thus it’s also creating a supply shortage — so from the shipments perspective, it will drop from 2018 going into 2019,” he added.

According to the global market intelligence firm’s latest Philippines PC Market Overview presented by Mr. Gornicki, 2019 shipments of PC units are projected to decline by 8%.

Last year’s PC imports grew 16.6% to 2.4 million units, the highest since at least 2014.

Acer led the growth, accounting for 20% or about 490,000 units of the total.

The growth was attributed to government’s modernization program of ongoing digitization to boost PC use in small and mediumsized businesses and in educational institutions, as well as investments from the private sectors — sectors which are seen to continue boosting the local PC market.

Mr. Gornicki said the Philippines, however, has a PC penetration rate of 7%, a low level when compared to that of other Southeast Asian economies, like Malaysia with 26% and Singapore with 40%.

Nevertheless, Mr. Gornicki sees the Philippines as “a market full of opportunities” amid growing foreign investments and the increasing purchasing power of Filipinos.

The IDC official also noted that 60% of shipments last year were units priced below $300, but this share has been dropping slightly over the past few years as devices in the higher price range gained traction.

“What the data shows is that Filipinos are really wiling to spend more on devices they care about attractive design, and they care about specs,” Mr. Gornicki added.

In 2020, the IDC expects the market’s decline to temper to 1.6%. In 2021, 2022 and 2023, shipments are seen to grow 0.4%, 0.3% and 0.2%, respectively. —