As strange as it may sound, traditional PCs are becoming the most expensive technological product, even if the number of buyers is constantly decreasing.
Lenovo, the world's largest PC maker, recently said that PC prices are set to rise further in 2017 due to component shortages. Specifically, a company representative at a recent conference emphasized that the shortage of components such as memory, batteries and displays is very important, which necessarily leads to an increase in the cost of sale regardless of their form factor (desktops, laptops or 2-in-1s).
A second reason for the price increase is the decline in the number of buyers. It is no secret that manufacturers have been experiencing a major crisis in recent years and it seems that the same trend will continue in the coming quarters. Therefore, by increasing prices, they are trying to maintain profit margins.
A recent report states that global sales of traditional computers including desktops and laptops reached 70.2 million units in the fourth quarter of 2016, corresponding to a decline of 1.5% per year.
Lenovo is the number one PC manufacturer with 15.6 million units sold inQ4 2016, followed by HP with 15.2 million and Dell with 11 million units. On the other hand, Apple and ASUS are down 0.9% and 11.3% respectively with sales falling by 5.2 and 5.1 million units.
At this point, of course, it is difficult to estimate how large the increase in the cost price of new units will be, but the only certainty is that construction companies will increase them as soon as this spring.
