The Toshiba Qosmio
Electronics manufacturer Toshiba is to cut its PC workforce by about 900 people and withdraw from certain consumer markets.
PCWorld reports Toshiba is to restructure its consumer PC operations and will focus on sales to business clients. The company will also reduce its global sales bases from 32 to 13 during its 2014 fiscal year.
The consumer models that will be retained following the cuts have not yet been revealed.
“The main reason is to secure consistent profit,” a Toshiba spokesperson told PCWorld.
“Toshiba does not plan to withdraw from the PC business as there are cases in which technologies developed for PC have been transferred to different business areas.”
After two years of decline, worldwide PC sales experienced a small amount of growth in the second quarter of 2014, according to information technology research company Gartner. Some 75.8m PCs shipped during the second quarter of 2014, representing a 0.1pc rise from the second quarter of 2013.
“The PC market’s installed based has been declining as buyers switched to tablets and smartphones for entertainment and social media consumption,” Gartner wrote in a statement.
“The 2Q14 results suggest that the consumer installed base restructuring peaked during 2013. We are seeing a slowdown in premium tablet sales, which have already penetrated a large number of households. PCs are now growing off a smaller installed base of newer devices, with more engaged users. Therefore, we expect to see slow, but consistent, PC growth.”
Toshiba has reported that PC sales “improved significantly” in the company’s April to June quarter.
