HP Passes Dell in Fourth Quarter, but Dell Is Number One for 2003

Computing giants Dell and HP continue to circle each other like predators in a "Jurassic Park" movie, with HP surpassing Dell in fourth-quarter PC shipments to retake the sales crown and the number-one position. However, Dell retained the title for 2003, selling more PCs for the year than its close rival. HP shipped 7.52 million PCs in the final quarter of 2003, compared with Dell's 7.24 million systems. But Dell sold 25.8 million PCs worldwide in 2003, compared with HP's 25 million PCs. Gartner says that PC makers sold 168.9 million PCs worldwide in 2003 (IDC places the figure at 152.6 million). In the United States, PC makers sold 44.6 million PCs, a jump of almost 16 percent, according to IDC, with the top-five PC makers (HP, Dell, IBM, Fujitsu, and Toshiba) experiencing gains of 15 to 23 percent.