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Enterprise computer buying is currently going through an incredibly strange economic cycle. New PC shipment numbers from IDC show a divide across global deployment trends. On the one hand, actual device shipments are down nearly 5% across the industry. On the other side, overall manufacturer revenues are growing because prices are increasing across the board. Component shortages, driven largely by AI data centers (on top of worldwide government deficit spending), are consuming global memory allocations and resulting in major price increases across the industry. Yet, on top of this widespread industry downturn in shipments, Apple stands alone as the only major computer manufacturer posting shipment growth.
About Apple @ Work: Bradley Chambers has been an Apple IT admin since 2009. Through his experience deploying and managing firewalls, switches, a mobile device management system, enterprise grade WiFi, 1000s of Macs, and 1000s of iPads, Bradley will highlight ways in which Apple IT managers deploy Apple devices, build networks to support them, train users, share stories from the trenches of IT management, and ways Apple could improve its products for IT departments.
Understanding the shipment divide
“The real story here is the disconnect between units and dollars: shipments are falling, but revenue is climbing because vendors are pushing through price increases faster than demand is dropping,” said Jitesh Ubrani, research director for consumer devices at IDC. “Given worsening macro conditions and a memory shortage that isn’t expected to ease until early 2028, we don’t expect another round of inventory pull-forward, which points to a sharp slowdown in growth rates in the second half of 2026. Vendors are bracing for further price hikes into 2027, and channels are already flagging concern about elevated inventory at these higher price points.”
While enterprise vendors like HP, Dell, and Lenovo all experienced negative unit growth last quarter, Apple pulled a 10% spike in shipments. A quick glance at the market might lead you to believe this growth is only attributable to the MacBook Neo, but it’s more nuanced than that. In my opinion, Tim Cook’s greatest contribution to Apple is how well ran its supply chains are. Apple was one of the last manufacturers to raise its prices. Yes, the Neo is playing its part, but it’s definitely more than that.
The MacBook Neo vs MacBook Air dilemma
What I am thinking about for enterprise buyers in the coming year boils down to Neo vs. Air. Said another way: lower cost on a shorter refresh cycle or a higher cost on a longer one?
In the 2010s, I aimed for 3-year refresh cycles. Today, with Apple’s success with the M series chips, I’ve moved to a 4-year plan. Today, the sheer longevity of Apple Silicon has safely stretched that window to 4 years or more. A four-year-old M1 MacBook Air equipped with a fresh battery would be an incredibly snappy, secure, and capable enterprise machine. In fact, that is what I see the Neo as.
When buying hardware intended to run in production for a full 4-year cycle, using a true entry-level product carries substantial operational risk for the buyer. If you go with the first-generation Neo and it craps out after 2.5 years, the buyer looks really bad. Today, no IT administrator is getting fired for deploying an M5 MacBook Air
What I think might be on the horizon as well is a 4-5 year”ish” refresh cycle. IT teams will likely try to extend lifecycles to offset rising hardware costs, provided Apple maintains its exceptional track record of supporting older chips with major macOS updates. The ultimate deciding factor will not be the physical hardware durability, but rather the local software requirements. If enterprise applications evolve to a point where they absolutely mandate raw neural processing power for local LLM/AI usage, this trend might reverse.
Wrap up
Component price pressures are not going away anytime soon. When planning your next hardware refresh, do not compromise on base memory configurations just to save a few dollars upfront. Right now, I believe it’s better to buy a MacBook Air with a proven enterprise footprint to ensure your fleet remains useful for the long haul. I’ll revisit the Neo as new generations roll out, but I really do believe that. IDC shows that Apple is still growing, and with price increases across the board, I believe It is better positioned to sell to enterprise IT than any other vendor.
Apple @ Work is exclusively brought to you by Mosyle, the only Apple Unified Platform. Mosyle is the only solution that integrates in a single professional grade platform all the solutions necessary to seamlessly and automatically deploy, manage, and protect Apple devices at work. Over 45,000 organizations trust Mosyle to make millions of Apple devices work ready with no effort and at an affordable cost. Request your EXTENDED TRIAL today and understand why Mosyle is everything you need to work with Apple.
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