310 Million PCs Expected To Ship This Year

As the demand grows in emerging countries, PC shipments are expected to grow over 15% this year, with double digit growth continuing through 2010.

The demand for PCs show no sign of abating, and thanks to emerging countries buying more of them, a continued double-digit increase in sales is likely to continue until 2010, followed by single digits until 2012.

Those predictions come from IDC’s latest Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker, which says demand will grow 15.2% this year with 310 million PCs shipping.

There’s been a change is the strength of markets, however, according to the analyst company, with Asia/Pacific (not including Japan) passing the US as the biggest PC market, with the Rest of World region, comprising Latin America, Central and Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa, and Canada, coming up fast, and expected to take second place by the end of the year.

Much of the PC market strength is coming from the lower-cost ultra-portable notebooks like the Eee PC.

Loren Loverde, director of IDC’s Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker, said:

“Despite recent economic pressure, the consistent gains fuelled by portable adoption, falling prices and new users – particularly in emerging regions – will continue to drive growth during the forecast.”