Printer Business Drops In Q1: IDC

In its latest Worldwide Quarterly Hardcopy Peripherals Tracker, research firm IDC reported that worldwide shipments of hard-copy peripherals, including printers and multifunction printers, totaled 26.4 million units in the first quarter of 2009, down about 17.6 percent compared with the first quarter of 2008.

Shipments in the U.S. market, however, fell by a more moderate 13 percent in the same period to reach a total of 6 million units.

Of all types of printer devices, MFPs were the least impacted by the economy, with shipments of MFPs falling about 10 percent year-over-year. Of those, color laser MFP shipments actually rose 6 percent during the quarter to 632,000 units, IDC said.

The single-function printer market was slammed, with shipments plunging 28 percent as the market continues to move toward MFP devices.

IDC found that the total sales of printers worldwide fell 21 percent to $12.8 billion in the first quarter of 2009, the third consecutive quarterly decline.

Phuong Hang, program manager, IDC Worldwide Hardcopy Peripheral Trackers, wrote that he expects the hard[-copy peripherals market to recover in 2010, but until that happens, vendors need to step up their game.

"IDC expects that vendors will employ several strategies to weather the current economic downturn," he wrote in a statement. "The battle will continue in the channel to gain go-to-market strength and capacity. Vendors will also focus on offering cost-cutting and/or productivity enhancements to customers' existing document infrastructure as well as driving managed print services."

IDC said that Hewlett-Packard led the printing pack despite a 24 percent drop in shipments in the quarter compared with the same period a year ago. Even so, HP remained the top vendor for the quarter, with 41 percent market share, down from 44 percent in the first quarter of 2008.

Canon took the No. 2 spot among vendors in the first quarter of 2009. The company's unit shipments declined just 6 percent year-over-year, resulting in increased market share of 17 percent, up 2 points from the first quarter a year ago.

Epson, the No. 3 vendor in the market, saw its unit shipments fall 13 percent in the quarter, compared with a drop of 14 percent in the same period a year ago.

Brother, the fourth player among the top companies, was the only vendor with positive year-over-year growth. Its 3 percent growth in shipments to 1.9 million units gave it a 7.1 percent share of the total hard-copy peripherals market, up from its 5.6 percent share in the first quarter of 2008.

Rounding out the top five vendors was Lexmark, which saw its share of the market fall 1 point to 5 percent on shipments of 1.3 million units in the first quarter of 2009.