Robert Pogson

That is M$’s market share lately according to their recent 10-Q.

“Client revenue increased reflecting growth in licensing of Windows Vista. Revenue from commercial and retail licensing of Windows operating systems increased $125 million or 22%. OEM revenue decreased $46 million or 1% while OEM license units increased 8%. The decline in OEM revenue reflected the four percentage point decrease in the OEM premium mix to 71% as well as changes in the geographic and product mixes. Based on our estimates, total worldwide PC shipments from all sources grew 10% to 12%, driven by demand in both emerging and mature markets.”

Notice that their OEM units only increased 8% while they estimate PCs produced increased 10-12%. What a huge shift in one year. Thank the netbook. Thank FLOSS. Thank GNU/Linux. There is competition in the market for desktops.

The netbook continues to be hot. GNU/Linux continues to be hot in emerging markets. This is not a blip or one-time event. It is the process towards freedom. Freedom to use our PCs as we wish. Freedom to buy hardware unencumbered by the M$ tax. Freedom from DRM, bloat, and bugs.

On hardware, AMD is struggling. They are re-organizing by shedding fabs. I hope this permits them to move more rapidly to 45 nm which will make them competitive with Intel at the high end. They really need a good low-power chip at 45 nm to compete with Atom. Can you imagine the price of netbooks with two comparable chips in the market? The Chinese have a RISC chip that they can produce too. It is all good.

I do not know whether 2007, 2008 or 2009 will be known as the year of the GNU/Linux desktop, but I bet it will be one of them. 2007 marked breakthrough in retail and the netbook. 2008 was the explosion of the netbook, serious adoption in emerging markets, particularly BRIC, and 2009 will be a very good year still without Vista II/7/any other catchy name M$ can spew. Everyone seems to know they have a choice now.

UPDATE!!! On 2008-11-3, IDC reports this:

“Worldwide PC processor unit shipments grew 14.0% quarter over quarter (QoQ) and 15.8% year over year (YoY); market revenue grew 7.6% QoQ and 4.1% YoY to $8.3 billion. Intel’s new Atom processor for ultra low-cost mobile PCs (which Intel calls “Netbooks”) made a notable difference in the overall market performance; without Atom, unit shipments grew 8.3% QoQ and 8.7% YoY.”

This means M$’s estimate was a little low…. If shipments grew 14% and M$’s sales of client licences grew 8%, It means M$ is about to experience serious shrinkage of market share… It is about time. In a few years they will have 60% market share, more than they deserve.