PC shipments have increased for the first time in six years, research firm Gartner has revealed, although companies have been warned the momentum is unlikely to continue.
Worldwide PC shipments added up to 62.1 million units in the second quarter of this year, which represents a 1.4% increases year-on-year.
"PC shipment growth in the second quarter of 2018 was driven by demand in the business market, which was offset by declining shipments in the consumer segment," said Mikako Kitagawa, principal analyst at Gartner.
"In the consumer space, the fundamental market structure, due to changes on PC user behavior, still remains, and continues to impact market growth. Consumers are using their smartphones for even more daily tasks, such as checking social media, calendaring, banking and shopping, which is reducing the need for a consumer PC."
He added that momentum in the business segment would weaken as companies will have already replaced their legacy PCs with Windows 10 machines. This means PC vendors need to prepare for this tail-off and that a major part of their business strategy should be to find ways to extract revenue from firms that have already upgraded their hardware.
European shipments grew 1.3%, with strong demand for business PCs in Germany and the UK. Eurasia, which includes Russia, saw the strongest growth for the EMEA region.
From a vendor point of view, Lenovo was the market leader following its acquisition of Fujitsu, with shipments increasing by 10.5%. Dell also had an excellent quarter, with shipments growing by 9.5%, while HP's 6.1% put it in third place for growth, although it remains in second place in terms of market share.
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