"Germany achieved the best performance of the three major markets in Europe this quarter," said Meike Escherich, principal analyst at Gartner, based in the UK. "However, despite indications of improved consumer confidence, buyers are extremely price sensitive and the volumes shifted further to the lower price points - even more so than in past quarters."

In the third quarter of 2009, the PC market in Germany saw an increase of 12 per cent in sales of mobile PCs. Desktop demand declined 10 per cent year-on-year. The weakness in the professional segment slowed down with a decline of 3 per cent year-on-year.

The double-digit growth in the consumer sector (10 per cent), and especially the strong performance in the mini-notebook segment, was once again reflected in vendor performances. Sales of mini-notebooks accounted for one in four mobile PCs shipped in Germany during the quarter.



In the third quarter of 2009, Acer and ASUS saw growth as a result of continuous strong mini-notebook shipments. Together with Samsung they supplied more than 80 per cent of all mini-notebooks. HP maintained its No. 1 position in the desktop segment but lost its lead to Acer in the professional segment. Dell and Fujitsu lost further market shares respectively and Dell saw the worst decline this quarter, at 27.4 per cent year-on-year.

"The German economy is currently emerging from its deepest post-war recession, but the recovery will be restrained by the need to limit the deterioration of public finances," said Ms Escherich. "We forecast another slowdown in PC demand during the first half of 2010 compared with the latter half of 2009 and a sustained recovery should only start in late 2010. In addition, while a new operating system release is not a growth driver as such, the Windows 7 release timing is nevertheless favourable as the end of the usual 12-month testing phase for organisations should coincide with renewed investments by the professional segment."

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This article is part of a series:

- Western Europe PC Market declined slightly in 3Q/2009

- Acer now tops UK list of PC vendors

- France: Mini-notebooks drove return to growth

- Germany: PC shipments saw return to growth