Global notebook shipments, excluding detachable models, surged over 10% to hit a fresh high of 60 million units in 4Q 2020, driven by robust demand for remote work amid the pandemic woes, e-commerce promotions and government subsidies to consumers, Taiwan’s Digitimes Research revealed.
Over the entire 2020, global shipments advanced over 25% to a 9-year high of 201 million units
Due to the stay-at-home economy driven by the coronavirus, notebook shipments are expected to stay robust in 2021,
As brand vendors continue to pull in shipments from ODMs to thicken their inventories supporting stay-at-home economy in the months ahead, worldwide notebook shipments are expected to fall by less than 10% in first-quarter 2021, a significant improvement from previous sequential falls of 15-25% for the same quarter.
Digitimes said the leading brands are expected to post only slight falls in 1Q 2021 shipments, due partly to a lower comparison from 4Q 2020 amid significant components shortages.
Top vendor HP may ramp up its shipments of Chromebooks in the quarter.
Lenovo may not be able to see the same shipment momentum as its peers in Q1 2021 as its channel distributors in the US and Europe need to clear higher inventory levels for the preceding quarter.
Dell, with commercial-use notebooks commanding over 60% of its shipments, may see shipments for first-quarter 2021 fall at a larger pace than HP, due to a higher comparison basis for 4Q 2020, when both shipments to enterprise clients and those of Chromebooks increased because of the pandemic.
