According to MIC (Market Intelligence Center), an ICT industry research institute based in Taipei, the year-end peak season for the notebook PC market has stimulated brand-name vendors to increase their orders with Taiwanese notebook PC makers. It is therefore expected that Taiwanese notebook PC shipment volume will grow 12.8% sequentially to 19.0 million units in the fourth quarter of 2006.

Looking ahead to 2007, the launch of Intel's new platform Santa Rosa and Microsoft's new operating system Vista will inject growth momentum in the industry. Meanwhile, 2007 will witness the start of a large-scale replacement cycle for notebook PCs. Therefore, it is expected that the scale of the global notebook PC market will grow 21% to 87 million units in 2007. Taiwanese notebook PC shipment volume is expected to jump 25% to 78 million units.

In the third quarter of 2006, the global notebook PC market experienced considerable growth in demand. Demand in the European market rebounded in the third quarter, with Acer, Asus, and HP experiencing strong shipment in this region. The US market also grew, stimulating shipment growth for various vendors. In the Asia-Pacific region, the October 1 holiday period in China was a major growth driver. Consequently, Taiwanese notebook PC shipment volume reached 16.9 million units in the third quarter, up 26.2% year-on-year and 23.8% sequentially.

Benefiting from the growth in market demand, Taiwanese notebook PC shipment value hit US$9.8 billion in the third quarter, up 20.5% year-on-year and 23.1% sequentially. Due to the upturn in notebook PC demand, pressure on component manufacturers caused by oversupply was alleviated. Meanwhile, price declines of key notebook PC components were limited, as evidenced by the price rebound of notebook PC panels in September, with prices of mainstream 14W and 15W panels rising 3%. Optical disk drives and hard-disk drives only experienced small price declines. Furthermore, shipment share of high-priced Napa platform products rose to over 40% in the third quarter. Consequently, ASP (Average Selling Price) of Taiwanese notebook PCs slipped only US$3 sequentially, and 4.6% year-on-year, to approximately US$579 in the third quarter.

More information can be found in the following MIC report.  The Greater Chinese Notebook PC Industry, 4Q 2006

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