It does seem that people are still buying computers

PC shipments grew faster than expected in 2Q - Yahoo! News

Computer shipments rose faster than expected in the second quarter, fueled by exceptional demand in emerging markets and a decline in prices in the U.S. and Western Europe, two research groups said Wednesday.

Worldwide shipments increased 16 percent from a year ago to 71.9 million PCs, according to Stamford, Conn.-based Gartner Inc. The company had predicted 11.2 percent growth.

The other day, we were in a session with our city mayor who recounted a folksy tale which was quite relevant (I’ve changed some details to make it more techie).

“John has always been uneasy…. He believed he has worked as long as Peter in the company, and worked even longer hours, but Peter was getting better pay.

At length, he went to see his manager, and asked for a raise.

While they were talking, a truck drove up in front of the office building, and the manager asked John to ask what they have onboard.

John came back and said it was a delivery of computer supplies from XYZ Trading.

The Manager asked John again to go back and ask what was being delivered.

John came back and said it was 100 pcs of HP ink cartridges, and 200 units of HP inkjet printers that the company has ordered.

The manager then asked John to check who ordered the stocks and for what reason.

John checked and came back that the inks was an order from customer ABC, and that the 200 units HP inkjet printers were for stocking.

As they were talking, Peter came in.

The manager then asked Peter to the delivery person to ask why there was a truck parked in front of their office building.

Peter came back and answered.

“The truck is from XYZ trading, and they are delivering to us 100 pcs of HP ink and 200 pcs HP inkjet printers. This was ordered by Maggie, and the ink was for delivery to ABC, which whose account started buying from us 3 month sago, and was handled by Matt. The inkjet printers were for stocking as there is a special promo which allows us to get it 5% cheaper if we can order 200 pcs, but there was no worries since at current run rates, that can easily be sold within 3 weeks. “

“And by the way”, Peter added,” while I was talking to the delivery guy, I noticed there was a lot of Lexmark printers in the truck, and he told me that was ordered by competitor B who have been selling it pretty well. I checked and noted that there was a new model of Lexmark just came out, and I believe we should start to order and promote it. I called the supplier, and he said he could give it to us at special x price which is a 3% discount if we can order 150 untis, which I think we can confidently sell in 2 weeks time.”

As John listened, he started to understood why Peter was earning more than him.

I liked the quotation of the State Street global Advisors - ” The Naked Eye sees Ten Good Investments. The Trained eye sees one.”