Japanese shipments of mainframe computers fell 13 percent by value in the year ended March 31, reflecting a drop in domestic sales and falling prices for many models, an industry group said.
Revenue fell even as the number of mainframes shipped increased, reflecting surging exports to the United States.
The value of Japanese-made mainframes shipped worldwide declined to 976.4 billion yen, the Japan Electronics Industry Development Association said. The decline follows an 8 percent rise the previous year. The number of units shipped rose 7.1 percent to 4,396.
Japan’s largest makers of mainframe computers, such as Fujitsu Ltd., NEC Corp., IBM Japan Ltd. and Nihon Unisys Ltd., are finding it harder to profit from mainframes as prices fall worldwide on more expensive models, and less expensive mainframes lose market share to servers–the workhorse computers at the heart of networks of less-powerful personal computers.
The extended fall in prices of larger mainframe computer systems was the main reason for the decrease by value, JEIDA said. The increasing popularity of servers hurt volume sales of smaller mainframes, it said.
JEIDA expects mainframe prices to continue to decline through March 1999. The industry group forecasts shipment value will fall narrowly in the year, on stable volume.
Domestic mainframe shipments fell 14.6 percent in value to 823.1 billion yen in the year to March 31. The number shipped fell 6 percent to 2,822.
Mainframe exports surged 43 percent by volume, yet by value decreased 3.3 percent to 153.3 billion yen.
In the domestic market, mainframes costing more than 250 million yen saw the biggest declines, falling 18.5 percent in value and 11.7 percent by volume.
Shipments of mainframes costing between 40 million yen and 250 million yen rose 8.0 percent by value but fell 5.9 percent by volume.
Mainframes costing less than 40 million yen fell 35.7 percent by value even as shipment volume rose 9.8 percent.
