The Hanoitimes -  Vietnam ’s computer market in the fist quarter of the year plummeted by 27 percent compared to the fourth quarter of last year.

The figures provided by International Data Corporation, a provider of market intelligence, also showed that of the total 434,000 units produced and imported in the first quarter, 68 percent of those were personal computers, while 30 and 2 percent were laptops and netbooks, respectively.

The company’s PC market analyst Phan Yen said the peak time of sales before the Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday was over, resulting in a slump of demand.

Yen said foreign PC companies had sharply reduced their prices while customers were paying more attention to brand-name PCs, creating more difficult conditions for domestic products to compete with foreign o­nes.

But Yen said she was confident the market would still reach the year’s growth target of 19 percent after strong consumption over the last two quarters.

" Vietnam ’s PC market is expected to see slight growth in the second quarter. The market is expected to go through a strong growth period by the end of the year as companies strive to reach their set targets," she said.

Sharing Yen’s optimism, marketing director of CMC Corporation, a leader in the local IT market, Ho Quoc Hue said the market would grow by the end of the year as the economy shows signs of recovery and consumer sentiment is forecast to rise.

In the first quarter, computer maker HP continued to rank first with 14.7 percent of the market share. Dell was second with 8.7 percent, while Acer and Toshiba trailed behind in third and fourth with 7.8 percent and 3.4 percent, respectively.