North African HCP Market Stumbles

International Data Corporation (IDC) reports that North Africa’s hardcopy peripherals (HCP) market in Q3 2014 has seen a remarkable year-on-year decline due to a deceleration in spending by governments and large enterprises.

According to IDC, because of the postponement of many public and private sector tenders ahead of elections in Tunisia which had a particularly negative impact on proceedings in the region, the overall market dropped 34.0% in volume and 17.8% in value for the quarter.

Tunisia, Algeria and Moroccan, the three countries that make up IDC’s North Africa grouping, all incurred significant year-on-year declines in Q3 2014. Tunisia suffered a 47.8% downturn in HCP shipments for the period, with the market’s value down 13.2%. Algeria saw a 40.6% decline in volume and a 24.2% slump in value, while the Moroccan market shrank 21.9% in volume and 14.0% in value.

As the hardest-hit segment in the region, the inkjet segment suffered volume declines of 44.8%, 42.1%, and 69.9% in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia respectively. Corresponding decreases in value were respectively 19.6%, 42.6%, and 50.1%.

Imane Belhabes, a research analyst for imaging, printing, and document solutions at IDC North and Francophone Africa, said, “The major driver of the inkjet segment’s downturn was a notable decline in entry-level shipments, particularly in Morocco and Tunisia. This can be explained by the fact that some vendors started to focus on more profitable market segments, which translated into strong growth rates for both the midrange and high-end segments of the market. Meanwhile, the poor performance of the mono laser market came as a result of weak tender activity in the region, as government projects are the main source of demand for such devices, particularly at the lower end of the market.”

Though performing slightly better, the mono laser market still saw negative result. Algeria stumbled the most, with year-on-year declines of 49.0% in volume and 50.7% in value. Mono laser shipments dropped 12.8% with 16.3% decline in value in Morocco while the shipments decreased 29.7% with value declines of 1.9% in Tunisia.

Color laser shipments to North Africa were up 6.3% in volume year on year in Q3 2014, totaling around 5,000 units. The growth was driven by a stellar performance across all speed segments in Algeria, where shipments were up 47.9% in volume and a significant 98.7% in value. But Morocco and Tunisia saw unit declines of 7.6% and 6.1% and to year-on-year revenue drops of 4.3% and 36.5%. These declines were mainly the consequences of declines in the low- and mid-speed segments.