iPad Assists Dell in Beating Acer in Q4 PC Sales

In terms of PC shipments, Dell pulled ahead of neck-and-neck competitor Acer

during the fourth quarter of 2010, according to a March 10 report from IHS

iSuppli. Helping Dell, said the firm, was the same device partly blamed for sluggish PC shipments the quarter

before: the Apple iPad.

The iPad and competing tablets, such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab, are hurting

sales of netbooks and notebooks — Ã–Acer’s bread and butter. According to IHS

iSuppli, Dell’s fourth-quarter PC shipments remained completely flat. It didn’t

move ahead so much as Acer fell backÃ–by 12.9 percentÃ–hurt by a loss of consumer

interest. (Between the iPad’s April 2010 launch date and December 2010, Apple CEO

Steve Jobs announced recently, Apple sold nearly 15 million tablets. More bad

news for the netbook makers: March 11 marks the debut of the iPad 2.)

“A little more than one year after a prolonged decline in shipments

caused Dell to lose its customary second-place ranking to rival Acer, Dell now

seems to have regained a firm hold on the No. 2 rank,” Matthew Wilkins, an

IHS iSuppli principal analyst, said in a statement. “Acer in the third

quarter of 2009 had surged to the No. 2 spot on the strength of its strong

sales of netbook PCs to consumers and a generally buoyant consumer market.

However, with momentum for consumer PCs waning and in light of growing

competition from media tablets, Acer’s gains have been reversed.”