Style matters for PC consumers

Style is the most important factor for consumers buying PCs, according to analysts at researcher Dataquest.

Suppliers should change the design of their hardware every six months and consider the different tastes of each regional market, said Philip Lu, a senior industry analyst at Dataquest.

Speaking to vendors at the researcher's Predicts 2000 conference in Silicon Valley this week, Lu said: "Style means form factor, colour, texture, functionality, ergonomic design and usability, but be aware that a new design may involve radical redesign of the manufacturing and logistics processes."

European buyers want the latest affordable style while consumers in Japan are early adopters of new technology, said Dataquest. PC buyers in the US want technology and feature-rich systems with customised applications, while the Chinese market is price-sensitive.

Dataquest said the PC market is still buoyant despite the hype surrounding personal digital assistants and internet devices. The researcher predicts that 201 million PC units will ship worldwide by 2003 compared with 114 million units this year.

The growth rate of portable PCs peaked at about 40 per cent in the second half of last year as consumers looked to replace their machines, while the desktop market is enjoying a resurgence thanks to three new business models, said Charles Smulders, a principal analyst at Dataquest.

The first model is free PCs, where customers get hardware free of charge in return for paying for ISP fees for a set period of time. But Smulders believes that these programmes will be short-lived. "Customers don't want to be stuck with the same ISP for three years," he said.

The second is the business subscription PC market in which small businesses receive free hardware but pay monthly fees for associated support and service. "Small companies need to be convinced that the downtime of their PCs will greatly affect their businesses to pay the support costs," said Smulders.

The third is the trend for companies to install PCs in the homes of every employee. Dataquest predicts that this will boost the home market and reduce corporate IT training costs.

The researcher also predicts that the average price of desktop PCs will fall from $1435 in the fourth quarter of last year to $1250 in 2001. The average cost of a mobile computer will drop to $1921 compared with $2142 in the fourth quarter of 1999.