Well, everything was fine for the industry in September and the same is likely to happen in October: traditional seasonal demand drives the revenues of computer components makers and personal computer vendors up, nevertheless, as I read over Silicon Strategies, there will be no Christmas surge in demand this year in Europe.

According to IDC, total worldwide PC shipments are now expected to reach 135.5 million units in 2002, a 1.1% growth rate over 2001. In 2001, PC shipments were 134.1 million units, down 4.2% over 2000, when the demand was on its rise. IDC states that in 2003 the market will grow to 147 million units, up 8.8% compared to this year. Nevertheless, the original figure was 11.1%, thus, the Framingham-based research firm is sceptical about the next year due to certain reasons.

IDC sees the source of the current problems with the IT industry in the fact that the personal computer’s functionality has not evolved for a number of years already. The performance that is provided by modern computers is, of course, indisputably higher compared to that offered in late 1999 or early 2000, though, it does not give anything new to both home or enterprise users.

As for the industry general recovery, it is now being postponed on the third quarter 2003 or even a bit later.