Office PCs

The PC is supposed to be the bellwether of the IT industry. So, where does the bellwether point to this year?

Our changed respondent profile means that traditional favorites, the assemblers, are no longer on top, both in the “currently owned” and “intend to buy” sections. As in previous years, Compaq, now HP (the company still sells both brands after the merger), is the winner in this bell-weather category of the IT industry. Again, as in previous years, IBM is number two.

There is a slight re-arrangement after that, with Assemblers coming in third, followed by HCL, Dell and Wipro in that order.

For Dell, this is the first year it has made it to the Users’ Choice list. Acer and Zenith just about failed to make it. The distance between HP and IBM, which has slowly been widening over the last two years, has increased further this year. Much of this, possibly, could be attributed to the HP-Compaq merger.

When it comes to brand loyalty, HP tops with an 81% loyalty, followed by IBM with 76%. All other brands have to watch out for HP, as it seems to be the preferred brand to shift to for current users. The only deviation is HCL, where the first choice shift is towards IBM, followed by HP. Given its low brand loyalty HCL has reason to worry.

This brings us to the geographical breakdown of brand preferences. In the West almost all brands gained some following. The North, on the other hand, had HP and IBM dividing between them a whopping 82% of the votes.

When we break it down by companies IT spend, we get an equally interesting picture. Companies in the Rs 50 lakh to Rs one crore band tend to have fewer brand choices than those below and above.

By verticals, banking is the most spread out in the number of brands they would buy from, while, consultants, telecom and BPO are at the other end of the spectrum.