January was a bad month for notebook manufacturers, with all major OEMs seeing a steep decline in worldwide shipments (~30%). Although the first quarter does normally see a drop in PC shipments, the Coronavirus factor certainly did a number on the overall sales.
HP was hit the worst with a drop of nearly 50% compared to Q4 2019. Lenovo also took some damage but managed to stay above HP in the end. Dell was the only notebook-maker that managed to see a spike in shipments both YoY as well as over the previous quarter. ASUS and Lenovo also felt the impact of the Coronavirus scare, with similar drops in sales (~30%).
According to Digitimes Research, the Coronavirus outbreak is going to have a severe impact on notebook production in the first quarter of 2020. As such we can expect the same trend to continue for the next couple of months or so. We’ll keep you posted in case something changes.
