Acer Up, Dell Down In Latest Notebook Numbers

According to iSuppli, in the fourth quarter Taipei, Taiwan-based Acer "sold 3.4 million mobile PCs, up 45.6 percent from 2.3 million in the third quarter, the highest sequential growth rate among the world's Top 5 notebook computer OEMs."

The data also pinned some more numbers on the decline of Dell. "Dell Inc. . . . posted the weakest performance of the Top 5 mobile PC OEMs in the fourth quarter, with its shipments declining to 3.52 million units, down 1.5 percent from 3.57 million in the third quarter."

According to the iSuppli numbers, Hewlett-Packard was top dog in mobile PCs during the fourth quarter, shipping more than 5 million units. Rounding out the top 5 were Toshiba, which shipped 2.5 million mobile PCs, and Lenovo, which shipped 1.9 mllion.

iSuppli said much of Dell's issue is simply tougher competition from Hewlett-Packard and "a generally tougher battle with other OEMs in the wider mobile PC market." There was no mention of Dell's 4.2 million-unit notebook battery recall, which also couldn't have helped.

HP didn't have to recall any notebook batteries in the second half of last year, which couldn't have hurt.

Overall for 2006, almost 80 million mobile PCs shipped worldwide, iSuppli said.