Hardcopy device market hit hard by financial crisis

March 16, 2009: According to IDC, the world of hardcopy peripherals, such as multi-function printers, underwent a precipitous double-digit decline in the fourth quarter of 2008, with shipments falling 17 percent year-on-year, and revenue dropping 13 percent.

This drop left shipments at 32.6 million units, and revenue at US$15 billion, and it is the second consecutive quarter the market has slipped. That said, IDC is upbeat about the decline with its U.S. director of Hardcopy Peripheral Trackers & Forecasts, Alyson Frasco, saying that the firm expects to bottom out in 2009 following the global financial crisis before recovering in 2010.

According to Phuong Hang, the program manager of the firm’s tracker, the next year will see vendors employ several strategies to weather the downturn.

“The battle will continue in the channel as vendors seek to gain go-to-market strength and capacity,” says Hang. “Vendors will also focus on offering cost-cutting and productivity enhancements to customer’s existing document infrastructure as well as driving managed print services.”

IDC says that the inkjet market remained the dominant segment in Q4, 2008, with 22.8 million units shipped, but it was also hit the hardest with -18 percent year-over-year growth. Monochrome laser was the second largest technology segment with 7.2 million units shipped and year-over-year shipment growth of –17.3 percent.

The analyst firm says that colour laser shipments, the third largest segment, was essentially flat year over year and was the only segment not to experience a decline in the quarter.

The MFP market remains the dominant product type in the overall hardcopy peripherals market with 63.3 percent of the 20.7 million unit shipments in Q4, 2008, and was the least impacted of the product types with a –12 percent year-over-year decline.

The printer market was hit hard with a –24 percent growth rate and shipments of just 11.8 million units, illustrating that the market is continuing to move to MFP devices.

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