E-Business
Holiday Promotions Jerk up EMEA Q4 PC Shipment to 2.0% – IDC
PC shipments in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA) reached 25.5 million units in the fourth quarter of 2014, a 2.0% increase year on year, according to International Data Corporation (IDC).
Strong consumer demand during the holiday season helped keep the market at positive levels for the third consecutive quarter, albeit modest and patchy across the region, leading to 5.5% growth for 2014 with 93.3 million PCs shipped in EMEA.
Once again, there were strong regional differences in EMEA.
Western Europe continued to drive growth with shipments increasing 10.7%. In line with expectations, Central and Eastern Europe contracted 18.7%.
The Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 2.6%.
The market was primarily driven by healthy consumer shipments in Western Europe. Vendors continued to stock up ahead of Christmas and January promotion sales, and before the February change to Bing promotions in mature markets excluding 15in. notebooks.
This resulted in portable PC shipments increasing 5.3% year on year in EMEA. As expected, desktop PC shipments contracted 3.5% during the quarter. Currency fluctuations have also had a strong impact in northern Europe, Russia, and other countries in Central and Eastern Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (CEMA), while an unstable political situation and macroeconomic weaknesses continued to inhibit investments in parts of the region.
The dynamics across EMEA reflect a strong need for renewals in the mature markets, while highlighting that emerging economies continue to struggle.
“The growth in Europe is a positive sign for manufacturers. Past quarters saw consolidation in the market with HP and Lenovo emerging stronger than before,” said Chrystelle Labesque, research manager, IDC EMEA Personal Computing.
In Western Europe, shipments for the holiday season and post-Christmas promotions underpinned the growth particularly in the consumer space. Central Europe did not see any major uplift, whereas France and the U.K. showed solid double-digit percentage growth. Southern Europe (Spain, Greece, Portugal, and Italy) has been on a recovery path after years of decline.
Promotions have been key to driving demand and boosting consumer portable PC shipments by 18.2% and consumer desktops by 13.2%.
The positive impact of the end of Windows XP support on desktops ended, which explained the 3.9% decline in commercial shipments.
In addition, pockets of inventory across the region led to a further drop in sell-in of business desktops.
As expected, commercial demand remained strong for portable PCs, which posted a 12.6% increase. Overall desktop shipment growth in Western Europe reached 1.6% and portable PCs 15.9%.
“PC manufacturers prepared very attractive consumer offers this Christmas, with low price points supported by Windows 8.1 with Bing edition, which enticed end users to renew their devices,” said Maciek Gornicki, senior research analyst, IDC EMEA Personal Computing. “With the conditions of the promotion about to change, inventories have been built up this quarter, contributing further to higher levels of stock in the supply chain, which might translate into deceleration in consumer shipments in the first half of 2015. In the commercial segment, the wave of desktop renewals following the end of Windows XP support ended abruptly, while refreshes of portable PCs related to the introduction of Windows 7 four years ago continued and kept the commercial portable market healthy.”
Stefania Lorenz, associate VP, IDC CEMA, said 2014 ended with the PC market in the CEE region contracting 14% year on year as 4Q followed the trends witnessed in the previous quarters, reporting an annual decrease of 18.7%.
“For the second consecutive year the CEE region contracted by double-digit units,” she said. “2014 was affected mostly by the events in the eastern part of the region. Devaluation of the currencies in Russia, Ukraine, and Kazakhstan has had the biggest impact on purchasing power. All other countries in the region reported healthy demand for the full year with double-digit growth.”
“The PC market in Central Europe reported overall year-on-year growth of 7.9% in 4Q driven by portable PCs,” said Nikolina Jurisic, product manager, IDC CEMA.
“Demand in the consumer space was driven by the continually attractive prices offered by MS Windows 8.1 plus Bing. The commercial sector recorded even stronger year-on-year growth as there is a clear need to replace the outdated installed base in addition to updates from XP operating systems.
“The MEA region recorded positive growth of 2.6% year on year, thanks to the stronger demand witnessed in Turkey and Saudi Arabia. While Saudi Arabia recovers after the introduction of a new labor law in 2013 that had negatively affected the market, expected changes in the import-tax law in Turkey at the beginning of 2015 have certainly contributed to additional electronic products being shipped into the country.”
Vendor Highlights
The top 3 players in EMEA account for more than half of the market and the top 5 for more than 70% following strategic decisions by Samsung and Sony to further invest in the region.
•HP outperformed the market and consolidated its share at more than 23% in EMEA. The vendor made strong gains particularly in the portable PC area with solid 29% growth, taking the lead in both product categories, despite a small contraction in desktop shipments. New products like Stream and convertibles were very prominent during the holiday season promotions.
•Lenovo maintained the strongest growth among the top players, continuously beating market expectations across EMEA and reaching almost 20% share in 4Q. It saw very significant growth in southern Europe (Italy, Spain, Greece, and Portugal).
•Dell grew faster than the market and consequently gained shares in EMEA. The vendor performed well in portable PCs and particularly in CEE. A consistent and strong strategy execution supported this.
•Acer recorded a softer performance, in part due to an unfavorable year-on-year comparison. Results in Western Europe were better than in the other subregions. Desktop shipments grew slightly while the vendor increased its focus on tablets.
•ASUS continued to grow aggressively in the desktop market, albeit from a small base, while the success in the tablet market seems to have come at the expense of portable PC shipments, which contracted slightly.
Outside the top 5 vendors, Apple ranked sixth, benefiting from stronger consumer demand. Toshiba’s stronger focus on the commercial market explains why it did not fully leverage consumer trends.
Fujitsu’s focus on commercial led to a decline due to the slowdown in the overall business segment. MSI was in ninth place and Wortmann was 10th.
E-Business
Kaspersky Discovers New Phishing Campaign Exploiting Google Tasks Notifications to Steal Corporate Credentials
Kaspersky has uncovered a new phishing scheme that abuses legitimate Google Tasks notifications to trick corporate users into revealing corporate login credentials.
By leveraging Google’s trusted @google.com email domain and notification system, attackers bypass traditional email security filters and exploit users’ trust in familiar services.
In this campaign, victims receive an authentic-looking notification from Google Tasks with the subject line “You have a new task.” The message creates the illusion that the recipient’s company has adopted Google’s task management tool, pressuring them to act quickly. The notification often includes elements of urgency, such as a high-priority flag and a tight deadline, to prompt the victim’s immediate response.
Upon clicking the embedded link, users are directed to a fraudulent form disguised as an “employee verification” page, where they are asked to enter their corporate credentials under the pretense of confirming their status. These stolen credentials can then be used for unauthorised access to company systems, data theft, or further attacks.
“Google’s vast ecosystem of services gets exploited by scammers. The scheme with Google Tasks is part of a broader trend observed before and continuing into 2026, where cybercriminals misuse legitimate platforms to distribute scams and phishing.
Notifications originating from legitimate domains naturally evade many spam and phishing filters, while the social engineering aspect – making it seem like an internal company process – lowers the victim’s guard,” comments Roman Dedenok, Anti-Spam Expert at Kaspersky.
E-Business
esentry 2025 Report Shows Healthcare, Financial Services and Telecoms as Staging Grounds for Increased Cyberattacks in Africa
Cyber adversaries targeting African organisations are increasingly shifting away from opportunistic attacks toward deliberate, sector-specific campaigns aimed at the continent’s most critical digital infrastructures, according to the esentry 2025 Annual Report released by esentry, Lagos-based Africa’s leading indigenous Managed Security Service Provider (MSSP).
The report identifies healthcare, financial services, and telecommunications as the primary staging grounds for high-velocity cyberattacks, reflecting a growing focus on sectors that underpin economic stability, public welfare, and digital connectivity across Africa.
The findings are drawn from one of the largest cybersecurity datasets analysed in the region. Over the course of 2025, esentry processed more than 31 billion security events, generating 3.5 million alerts and successfully blocking over 15,000 malicious attempts. This monitoring scale shows that, while traditional financial institutions remain a core target, the threat landscape has expanded to include digital lending platforms, healthcare systems that store sensitive personal data, and telecom operators responsible for national and regional connectivity.
Within the healthcare sector, the report highlights ransomware as the most acute risk, with attackers frequently exploiting exposed Remote Desktop Protocol (RDP) services to compromise patient data and disrupt essential medical operations. In financial services, organisations are facing a surge in credential abuse, insider-related threats, and info-stealer malware designed to enable fraud and unauthorised access. Telecommunications providers are increasingly targeted by highly tailored phishing campaigns and attacks on exposed web services, which aim to harvest credentials and compromise customer data.
Commenting on the findings, Gbolabo Awelewa, Chief Business Officer at esentry, said the nature of cyber threats across Africa has evolved significantly. “The threats we are seeing today are deliberate, informed, and carefully tailored to local enterprises. Attackers are exploiting trusted access and moving quietly within networks, which makes early detection critical. Our coordinated cybersecurity model, spanning Defence, Intelligence, Offence, and Security Engineering, allows us to combine scale, speed, and deep contextual insight to detect and neutralise threats before they escalate,” Awelewa said.
A defining trend identified in the report is the shift from overt system exploitation to the abuse of legitimate access. By leveraging compromised credentials and ‘living-off-the-land’ techniques, attackers can blend into routine enterprise operations and significantly delay detection. This approach has compressed the attack lifecycle, enabling adversaries to move from initial access to full operational impact in fewer than 15 days.
To counter this acceleration, the report emphasises the importance of early detection and automated response. esentry says it currently contains low-complexity incidents in under 90 seconds, using a combination of structured threat hunting and centralised telemetry to anticipate and absorb attacker pressure rather than reacting after damage has occurred.
As African organisations continue to digitise, the esentry 2025 Annual Report positions itself as a critical reference point for understanding the continent’s evolving cyber threat environment. The report concludes that protecting Africa’s digital trust will require a shift away from fragmented security tools toward disciplined, coordinated defence frameworks, what esentry describes as a unified Phalanx formation.
The African Development Bank Group (AfDB) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have launched an ambitious $10 billion project to support the adoption of Artificial Intelligence (AI) across the continent.
The 10 Billion Initiative intends to accelerate ethical AI adoption and inclusive digital economic growth in Africa.
The initiative follows the Nairobi AI Forum, which took place earlier this month in Kenya and brought together governments, private sector leaders, development partners, and tech innovators to define pathways for impactful AI adoption.
According to the organisations, the strategy is a co-designed collaboration between the Bank Group, UNDP, and commercial partners that aims to raise up to $10 billion by 2035.
The resources will be used to create up to 40 million new jobs across the continent by 2035, through targeted investments that provide the groundwork for AI and accelerate widespread adoption in everything from entrepreneurship and regional data infrastructure to policy frameworks and skill development.
Nicholas Williams, AfDB Group ICT operations division manager, commented: “As a leading multilateral development institution, the bank is leveraging its comparative advantage to ensure Africa is not left behind in the AI era.
“The AI 10 Billion Initiative paves the way for expanded partnerships and sustained investments that will accelerate AI entrepreneurship, strengthen data and infrastructure ecosystems, and support inclusive growth across the continent.”
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