Dell Stays Ahead of Acer in Q3 as PC Market Bounces Back

Dell, for the second straight quarter, held its lead over Acer during the global PC market's third quarter, market research firm iSuppli reported Dec. 7. The Texas PC maker, which remained in second place and was boosted by corporate PC sales, sold 11.3 million units, representing a growth of 7.2 percent over the 10.5 million it sold during the sluggish second quarter.

Year over year, Dell posted growth of 9.3 percent -- a figure that looks extra substantial when compared with the vendors sandwiching it: Third-place Acer suffered a decline of 0.7 percent, while market leader Hewlett-Packard fell by 0.2 percent.

"Consumer PC sales growth slowed in the third quarter partly because back-to-school sales were lower than expected," Matthew Wilkins, an iSuppli principal analyst, said in a statement. "However, since the second quarter, corporate demand for desktop PCs and entry-level servers has been strong, driven by companies' efforts to replace systems with newer, faster, more efficient computers. Dell has a higher mix of corporate business to the market than HP and Acer and therefore was less exposed to the consumer slowdown."

Lenovo finished in fourth place, putting in an impressive performance. With year-on-year growth of 32.9 percent, it shipped 9.2 million units during the quarter, up from 8.3 million the quarter before and 6.9 million a year earlier.