The FINANCIAL — Worldwide hardcopy peripherals (HCP) shipment value increased 1.7% year over year to $15.2 billion in the fourth quarter of 2014 (4Q14) while unit shipments declined -2.6% year over year to 30.8 million units during the same period, according to the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Hardcopy Peripherals Tracker.
Some notable accomplishments in the fourth quarter include:
Laser markets enjoyed positive year-over-year shipment growth in the fourth quarter and contributed to year-over-year growth of 0.8% for full year 2014. Within the laser segment, there were many positive growth areas, with notable increases in color laser but monochrome laser markets again contracted as the move to color products continues.
Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan) (APeJ), the largest region in terms of HCP shipments, outperformed all other regions by achieving a 1.7% year-over-year increase in 4Q14. The main drivers for growth in the region were the introduction of new models and channel expansions for a few major vendors. The APeJ region closed out 2014 with 1.8% year-over-year shipment growth.
Canon surpassed all other vendors in 4Q14, with most of its positive year-over-year shipment growth coming from mature markets, including the US, Canada, Japan, and Western Europe. As with Canon, HP also saw year-over-year increases in Canada and Western Europe, according to IDC.
“In 2015, color laser is expected to widen its lead over monochrome laser worldwide. This is largely due to continued strong growth of color laser MFPs. While both color and monochrome laser MFPs are expected to grow in shipments and value in 2015, color laser growth is expected to be exponentially higher for both metrics. This worldwide trend is due to activity in both Western Europe and Japan, where color laser has dominated laser value shipments for some time,” said Phuong Hang, Program Director, Worldwide Hardcopy Peripheral Trackers.
Key Hardcopy Market Transitions Taking Place in 4Q14
Inkjet still makes up the majority of the market, but the best market growth is in laser. Color laser shipments grew 8.0% in 4Q14 to 2.0 million units.
Single function to Multifunction: The single function printer market declined -4.5% year over year in the fourth quarter, and multifunction peripheral (MFP) shipments decreased -1.7%. However, MFPs had a strong performance in all color laser speed ranges, especially in 31-44ppm, growing 24.4% year over year.
Monochrome to Color: Color increased 1.4% from a year ago to 19.2% share versus its monochrome counterparts, which lost one point to account for 80.8% share in 4Q14. Color’s year-over-year growth was 8.0% while mono laser declined -1.4%. The strongest color speed segment was the 11-20 ppm (33.0% share), where HP did particularly well with the Color LaserJet Pro M276 MFP model family.
Move to Faster Speed Segments Accelerates: The 45-69ppm monochrome laser MFP segment exhibited the strongest year-over-year growth in 4Q14 at 30.1%, followed by 70-90ppm (3.2%) and 31-44ppm (2.1%). The mono laser 45-69ppm segment’s strong growth was fueled by Lexmark’s MX611 and MX711 family. In the color market, the 70-90ppm MFP segment did well at 51.6% year-over-year growth, followed by 31-44ppm at 24.4% and 11-20ppm at 16.6%.
The A3/A4 battle in the mid-speed market segments continues. A4 MFP devices gained penetration in the 31-69ppm monochrome segment with 78.3% share of the total monochrome A4/A3 MFP market in the same speed segment. The 12.7% year-over-year growth of the A4 31-69ppm MFP monochrome laser segment was driven by strong year-over-year results in the both A4 31-44ppm(4.3% growth) and A4 45-69ppm MFP segment (63.0% growth) with significant contributions from Lexmark (40.5%), Xerox(278.2%), and Samsung (191.5%).
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