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No bottom seen yet for PC sales plunge

Published Apr 12th, 2013 4:40PM EDT
PC Sales Drop Analysis

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This has been a pretty bad news week for Microsoft and we should probably expect a lot more of them going forward. Barron’s points us to a new note from Merrill Lynch software analyst Kash Rangan, who thinks that PC sales haven’t come close to bottoming out yet. In fact, Rangan estimates that “if roughly 50% of consumer PCs (20-25% of total) represent low-end devices which are at risk of cannibalization by tablets, then PC units need to decline by 20-25% to get to trough growth.” While this will certainly be a trying time for Microsoft and its OEM partners, Ragnan sees things stabilizing after consumers are through switching out tablets for new PCs because Microsoft still has a “stable and nicely growing enterprise business.”

Brad Reed
Brad Reed Staff Writer

Brad Reed has written about technology for over eight years at BGR.com and Network World. Prior to that, he wrote freelance stories for political publications such as AlterNet and the American Prospect. He has a Master's Degree in Business and Economics Journalism from Boston University.