Pandemic-fueled demand for more computing and graphics power shows no signs of slowing down. It has been widely reported that the supply of graphics cards and CPUs is very tight due to shortages of critical components, and now we learn that demand for laptops and desktops is also on the rise as more people are forced to work, study and entertain at home.
And while Lenovo is experiencing a new renaissance in demand for its line of laptops and tablets — the company is best known for laptops built under its IdeaPad, Yoga, Legion and ThinkPad brands — shoppers may struggle to find the laptop they want to buy if demand picks up further .
Mark Coppock/Digital Trends
Normally, Lenovo and its distributors maintain about six weeks’ worth of inventory at any given time, but demand during the pandemic has caused laptop inventories to drop to very low levels.
Gianfranco Lanci, Lenovo’s chief operating officer, said that “we fell to very, very low levels, and it’s still more or less at that level” in the company’s earnings call, according to a report in The Register, adding that “I would say that we haven’t seen any drop in demand” since the winter quarter.
“I think when I look at the world … from the US to Europe, China to Asia Pacific, I think our channel inventory has never been this low, and in some cases during the last quarter we were down for two to three weeks,” he said. said.
Component defects
Mark Coppock/Digital Trends
In 2020, according to the Canalys report, Lenovo was the first in terms of shipment volume and market share. With 87 million PCs shipped, the ThinkPad maker captured 19% of the market, ahead of competitors such as Apple, HP, Dell and Samsung. The company expects PC demand to only grow in 2021, with Lanci predicting 300 million PCs will be shipped this year.
Lenovo is not the only PC maker affected by the surge in demand while being constrained by component shortages. Competitor HP, which owns brands such as Omen, Envy and Spectre, noted that it has experienced shortages of integrated circuits and panels that have slowed production. Shortages of high-end chips from Intel, Nvidia and AMD are also accelerating supply-side shortages.
To address the component shortage, Intel created a promotional video ahead of CES this year highlighting how it used the pandemic to turn abandoned office space into manufacturing labs to increase CPU supply and improve yields. AMD and Nvidia predict that GPU inventories will not begin to normalize in the first half of the year.
More energy is needed at home
Image used with permission of the copyright holder
The situation could potentially worsen. As more people spend time on their devices, they’re likely to find they need higher performance, which could drive faster replacement cycles in the future, Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing said. This means that the increase in demand is likely to persist for some time.
This sentiment was echoed by Matt Baker, senior vice president of strategy and planning for Dell EMC, who stated in an interview with Seeking Alpha that as people are forced to turn on older computers at home that they shouldn’t otherwise be using because they were at work, they will soon realize that these devices need a refresh.
But while consumers may see this as bad news—discounts from overstocked warehouses may no longer be as great, and it may be harder to find the computer you want in stock—manufacturers are seeing more profits. Lenovo announced that its PC and smart devices division grew by 27%. And with tariffs on premium PC components, buyers should expect the price of a PC to rise this year.
Editor’s recommendations
Categories: GAMING
Source: newstars.edu.vn