Wednesday, April 30, 2003

Economy affects handheld market

Continuing economic stagnation affected the worldwide PDA market as shipments totaled 2.8 million units in the first quarter of 2003, an 11.1 percent decline from the same period last year, according to preliminary statistics from <A HREF="http://www.gartner.com/DisplayDocument?id=393011&ref=g_search">Gartner, Inc.</A> In the first quarter of 2002, worldwide PDA shipments totaled 3.2 million.

Palm held onto the top spot in the worldwide rankings with 32.8 percent of PDA shipments. Although Palm shipped more that twice the units of its nearest competitor, its market share continued to decline. Hewlett-Packard remained in the Number 2 spot with 16 percent of the market, followed by Sony, with market share of 13.3 percent. Toshiba and Sony showed the strongest growth among the top-tier vendors with growth rates of 276 percent and 60 percent, respectively.

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