PC Industry Turns Corner in Second Half, Price Peak Driven by Q3 Commercial Procurement

PC Industry Turns Corner in Second Half, Price Peak Driven by Q3 Commercial Procurement

The global personal computer industry is entering its traditional peak season in the second half of the year. Although this year’s sharp price increases in key components such as memory and solid-state drives have suppressed some consumer purchasing power, component price hikes are expected to stabilize in the third quarter. Combined with government and enterprise budgets being released in the fourth quarter, recovering commercial procurement demand and the launch of high-end on-premise AI computers will jointly support stronger PC industry performance in the second half.

Acer (2353-TW) stated that the peak of product price increases will occur in the third quarter, with prices expected to gradually stabilize in the fourth quarter. Although high prices are projected to result in double-digit declines in overall shipment volumes this year, significantly higher average selling prices could allow full-year revenue in Taiwan to remain flat compared to last year. Moreover, in the fourth quarter, commercial PC shipments are expected to clearly outperform the first half due to the initiation of enterprise procurement projects and budget absorption.

In terms of edge computing and high-end product development, MSI (2377-TW), in collaboration with NVIDIA, plans to officially launch its RTX Spark on-premise AI devices equipped with advanced chips at the end of the third quarter to early fourth quarter. Orders from markets such as the United States and China are extremely strong—initial inventory has already sold out, and customers are actively placing additional orders, making it a key new engine driving operations in the second half.

ASUS (2357-TW) is also aggressively positioning itself in the high-end edge computing market, joining the first wave of brands launching RTX Spark products. Since these devices help heavy users significantly reduce cloud resource costs and improve local computing efficiency, and given that memory supply remains tight in the second half, pre-orders for these products are expected to face supply shortages upon launch.

Although market research firms predict a 4% year-on-year decline in global PC shipments in the second quarter, ending previous growth momentum, market demand is rapidly shifting toward high-value-added products. Most brands have abandoned competing on price to boost volume and are instead accelerating their focus on artificial intelligence servers and on-premise AI products. By increasing average product prices and optimizing product portfolios, they aim to sustain revenue and profitability in the second half.