The last quarter of 2007 was a good quarter for the whole computer industry in general and for suppliers of graphics adapters in particular, recently released figures from Jon Peddie Research show. During the quarter Intel regained position of the largest graphics adapters supplier, whereas ATI, graphics product group of Advanced Micro Devices, managed to increase market shares across the board.

“The fourth quarter of 2007 was seasonally good, and saw significantly greater sequential growth from the 3rd quarter compared to last year. This is especially interesting since Q3 2007 was so good. The major growth in the desktop segments was for Mainstream and Value class add-in boards (AIBs) as is typical for the holiday period,” said Dr. Jon Peddie, president of Jon Peddie Research in Tiburon, California.

Total shipments for the quarter were 106.37 million units, up 16.8% over last quarter. Shipments were up 27% compared to the same quarter last year, figures from JPR show. While the increase compared to Q4 2006 impresses, the quarter-over-quarter growth is lower than in Q3, when shipments skyrocketed by 20%.

The biggest winner during the quarter was AMD’s ATI, which managed to increase shipments of its graphics adapters by whopping 29%, thanks to ATI Radeon HD 3800-series introduction and contract wins of the ATI Radeon HD 2000-series finally in full effect. Intel Corp. managed to boost sales of its chipsets with built-in graphics cores by 17%, just inline with the market trend. Nvidia Corp.’s and Silicon Integrated Systems Corp.’s shipments remained on the same levels, whereas Via Technologies/S3 graphics experienced dramatic 62.3% drop in sales of graphics products.

Overall, Intel saved its first place position claiming 41.1% against Nvidia’s 31.8%, while AMD moved up to 22.8%.

The market of desktop graphics adapters grew 8.3% in the fourth quarter to 66.8 million units. On the desktop Intel barely took back its first place position with a 37.7% share against Nvidia’s 37.1%, while AMD increased to 19%.

“There is little shift in market share between [discrete] GPU vendors quarter to quarter which suggests there is no channel stuffing or double ordering. However, Nvidia’s [GeForce 8800] has exceeded expectations and is on allocation, Mr. Peddie said.

Notebook graphics adapters continued their growth in units with 39.6 million units, a 35.7% growth from the last quarter, and 25.9% over this period last year, to claim 37.2% of the market. In the notebook market Intel held its dominant position with 47% and AMD took back the number two position at 29% (gaining 8.3% market share). Nvidia came in at 22.8%, figures from JPR show.

The demand towards personal computers in general and discrete graphics card in particular was strong in 2007, said Jon Peddia.

“2007 was an exceptional year and we don’t expect to see the same kind of growth in 2008,” Mr. Peddie added.

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