Xmas home PC market looks nasty
Vendors contacted by ZDNN unanimously admitted that sales were disappointing although, almost to a man, they requested anonymity.
One insider who was willing to comment was Larry Smith, UK consumer division manager at IBM.
"It's almost as if Christmas doesn't exist and I'm hearing the same thing from people in the consumer electronics and garment business too. The consumer PC market is not very buoyant and it's bad new for all PC manufacturers, especially those who focus only on that sector like Packard-Bell. It's nothing like what we would have expected."
Smith added that "although there are some amazing deals around", he didn't expect things to pick up.
"The Christmas market is dead now. The big ticket items sell last week of November or the first week of December."
Smith declined to put hard numbers on his comments but said that sales hadn't grown over last year's equivalent time space.