European desktop-monitor market soars

FEBRUARY 19--The European CRT and LCD desktop-monitor market in Q4 2002 reached another growth milestone, despite continued economic uncertainty across the region, according to first draft figures from a market-research survey by Meko (www.meko.co.uk). The volume of monitors shipped during the quarter exceeded 10 million units--the first time this many monitors has shipped in a three-month period since the company began its service. The last high point for the market was in Q4 2000, when 9.9 million units were shipped in the period.

An analysis of the figures shows that the market shares for the top-ten brands in the region are Samsung 15.41%; HP 9.91%; LG Electronics 7.07%; Philips 6.78%; Dell 6.73%; Fujitsu-Siemens 3.91%; AOC 3.84%; NEC CI 3.50%; Acer 3.09%; and Hyundai 3.08%.

The top supplier list is dominated by the major PC brands and the large Taiwanese and Korean monitor suppliers; AOC and Hyundai both made strong double-digit sequential and year-on-year gains to secure a place amongst the winners in Europe.

Looking at the trends by technology, it is clear that LCD continues to take share from CRT. The penetration of flat-screen monitor technology was more than 30% versus CRT, again another "first" in the European market as a whole. By region, the German-speaking countries of Austria, Germany, and Switzerland continue to shift quickly toward LCD, and the Swiss bought nine LCD monitors for every one CRT unit in Q4.

Overall, 17-in. LCD monitors are getting close to 10% of the European monitor market by volume. Meko expects that 17-in. LCD monitors will become the mainstream desktop display in future. The DisplayCast data shows that both 15-in. and 19-in. CRT monitors have a lower share of the market by volume than 17-in. LCD monitors.

With 19-in. LCD monitors also showing significant growth, this category saw its market share nearly double from Q3 to Q4. In Switzerland, nearly 5% of the market is represented by this category of flat-screen monitors.