IDC: Vista Delay Won’t Hurt PC Sales

According to IDC, the delay of Windows Vista will only have a slight impact on PC sales, which it still expects to grow by just over 10 percent a year through 2008.

Research firm IDC says that Microsoft’sdelay of Windows Vista until early 2007 will barely impact overall PC sales through 2008. Overall, IDC finds growth of the PC market is slowing, but will still be over 10 percent a year through 2008.

IDC believes overall PC market will slow in many regions, but Microsoft’s delay of Windows Vista will have a comparatively small impact, IDC feels, because 2006 was already going to be a slow sales year following a wave of replacement purchases and transition to portable systems, meaning the market base is comparatively up-to-date and wasn’t expected to be acquiring new systems in great numbers at the time of Vista’s release. Although IDC feels the consumer market will jump on Vista at the first opportunity, business and organizational users are expected to adopt Vista at a comparatively measured pace, putting the new operating system though structured evaluation before adopting it.

“Some consumers will certainly delay PC purchases until Vista is available, but we expect the delay to shift only moderate volume from the fourth quarter of 2006 into 2007 and will not cause a loss of sales,” explained Loren Loverde, who directs IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker. “The timing of the release will have some impact on when consumers buy, but not so much on whether or not they buy.”

Overall, IDC expects worldwide PC shipments to real 229.4 million units in 2006 and 254 million units in 2007, representing yearly growth rates of 10.5 and 10.7 percent, respectively.