With the help of its second best quarter ever, strong laptop sales, and record Mac shipments, Apple made signficant gains in the US market, achieving 4.8 percent marketshare in second calendar quarter of 2006 on year-over-year growth of 16 percent. According to market research firm IDC, Apple was the No. 4 PC vendor in terms of marketshare in US behind Dell (34.2%), HP (20.1%), and Gateway (6.5%); however, the Cupertino-based company achieved the second largest growth rate behind Gateway's 16.7 percent increase. Apple outpaced the industry's average of 6.7 percent in the US. Meanwhile, market leader Dell was only able to achieve 6.4 growth, while No. 2 HP achieved growth of more than 15 percent. Total shipments in the US were slightly ahead of forecasts.

IDC noted that portables growth in the US remained strong, while demand for desktops also made a significant contribution. For Apple, however, laptops sales surged 61 percent, while desktop declined during the same period, according company numbers. The company in its conference call said that strong MacBook sales at its retail stores and a strong higher education quarter contributed to the company's highest total Mac shipments in a 13-week quarter.

Apple also told investors that its laptop marketshare at US retail had doubled in 2006--surging from 6 percent in January to 12 percent in June.

Worldwide numbers, however, show that Dell (19.2%), HP (15.9%), Lenovo (7.7%), Acer (5.4%) and Fujitsu (3.4%) were among the top PC vendors. Acer showed the strongest growth of 35 percent, while Dell, HP, and Lenovo all posted double-digit gains. Apple was not listed among the top and IDC did not provide specific worldwide numbers for Apple.

"Apple shipments increased by double digits in the second quarter following a slow first quarter," IDC said. "Strong portable PC sales through its retail outlets had a significant impact with retail growing by 50% and portables by over 60% year on year. The strong growth reflects a successful transition to Intel-based systems -- a critical transition for the company that sets the stage for future growth."

Worldwide growth slowed by Europe

The worldwide PC market continued to grow at a healthy pace in the second quarter of 2006, although slow growth in Europe limited worldwide shipments to an increase of 9.7 percent year-over-year, according to IDC's Worldwide Quarterly PC Tracker. Overall, PC vendors shipped over 52.1 million PCs compared with over 47.4 millon in the second quarter of 2005.

"While overall growth remained strong, there were some unexpected twists in regional performance," according the market research firm. "Inventory from the first quarter and distractions from the World Cup significantly cut into European growth with shipments increasing by roughly 7 percent year-over-year compared to twice that the prior quarter and a forecast of 12 percent."