MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Dec. 14, 2000--In rough holiday news for leading CD-RW manufacturer Hewlett-Packard, online industry sales haven't increased so far this quarter, according to data provided by OneChannel.net, the only e-business intelligence platform reporting actual sales data at Internet speed. Even worse for HP, competitor Plextor -- and other smaller manufacturers such as QPS and Yamaha -- have made substantial inroads into this market at HP's expense.

Who is Leading?

So far this year, two key manufacturers -- Hewlett Packard and Plextor -- have dominated the CD-RW drive category at market shares of 21.9 percent and 21.8 percent, respectively. In overall sales this year, HP leads Plextor in category sales (at OneChannel.net's affiliated online retailers) by a very slight margin, but HP has steadily lost considerable sales and market from quarter to quarter over the course of this year.

How Big is the Gap?

From Q2 to Q3, HP sales fell 13 percent from $4.5 million to $3.9 million. But over that same time frame, Plextor sales actually grew 109 percent, from $3.1 million to $6.5 million. More recently (from October 1 through December 2), Plextor's reported online market share has grown to more than twice that of HP, at 34 percent to 14 percent, respectively.

Indeed, Plextor has enjoyed vigorous growth. During Q3, the most prosperous quarter for online CD-RW Drive sales, Plextor achieved a 29.6 percent share (up 12.7 share points from Q2), while HP's share fell to 17.5 percent (down 6.6 share points from its Q2 share).

Plextor's gains were mostly attributable to the new PlexWriter 12/10/32A, which has faster write and rewrite speeds than previous models; consumers seem to have been willing to pay more for this enhanced capability (an average $254 per drive versus an industry average of $218 per drive).

Other key manufacturers include Sony, Yamaha, and QPS, with year-to-date online category market shares of 9.7%, 9.6%, and 9.0%, respectively. Looking at trended quarterly performance, market share for Yamaha and QPS steadily increased, while Sony's share softened slightly over time. In particular, QPS picked up considerably in both sales and share during Q2 and Q3. Perhaps even more striking, between October 1 and December 2, the company's market share was up sharply, to 15.2 percent.

The Year in Review

The CD-RW Drive category posted online sales this year of $73 million through December 2. During Q1, CD-RW Drive online sales amounted to $18.7 million, softening about 1 percent over Q2 to $18.6 million (mainly due to slower sales in April).

Back-to-school buying seems to have made Q3 better, with sales increasing by a healthy 19 percent to achieve $22.2 million in sales. But current sales data haven't yet hinted at a healthy holiday spike. Indeed, total online dollars posted from October 1 through December 2 amounted to only about $13.6 million, not radically different from the average rate of sales in Q1 and Q2.

If you would like to learn more about online retail sales performance this holiday season, please visit OneChannel.net on the Web at www.onechannel.net.

OneChannel.net uses actual transaction data as reported by its retail partners. Due to retailer differences in reporting and shipping timeframes, there may be up to a 3 percent understatement of sales in this report. These anomalies are self-correcting over time as latencies in data are normalized.

About OneChannel.net Reports

OneChannel.net welcomes use of its data and reports by interested publications, media and analyst firms if attribution to OneChannel.net is included. To inquire about editorial or analytical usage of OneChannel.net data and reports, please contact Karen Clyne at 650/ 356-5221 or [email protected].

About OneChannel.net

OneChannel.net is the only e-business intelligence platform reporting actual sales data at Internet speed. OneChannel.net's flagship service, ChannelMetrics, provides actual product and aggregate market sales transaction information via the Web, 24 hours a day, worldwide. OneChannel.net has retail partners in multiple market segments, including industry leaders such as Best Buy, buy.com, CDNOW, Egghead.com, Outpost.com, and TowerRecords.com, in addition to a strategic alliance with Excite@Home. Based in Mountain View, Calif., OneChannel.net is privately held and funded by CNET Networks, America Online, Advanced Technology Ventures (ATV), Norwest Venture Partners and Selby Venture Partners. For more information, please go to http://www.OneChannel.net