POS Shipments Accelerated In EMEA Last Year
By Christine Kern, contributing writer
New research finds a 5.2 percent increase over 2014 levels.
Despite difficult economic conditions, the Retail PC-POS market managed to overcome was able to expand across the Europe/Middle East/Africa region in 2015, rising 5.2 percent over 2014 according to new research from IHL Group. For 2016, the company anticipates a 4.1 percent increase in total shipments thanks to strength in Germany, UK, Italy and Scandinavia as they continue to modernize systems.
As retailers move to upgrade POS and create a Unified Commerce approach to their sales, it is resulting in good news for POS vendors.
“The EMEA market has enjoyed strong replacements of existing units as retailers upgrade POS to pursue a Unified Commerce approach that consolidates online and store systems into a single order management process”, said Greg Buzek, President of IHL Group. “Retailers are upgrading their POS and infrastructure at the store level to further appeal to consumers.”
The 55-page study revealed that, despite the rash of macroeconomic issues in the Europe/Middle East/Africa region in 2015 that should have had a disastrous impact on the POS shipments to the region, both 2014 and 2015 actually had strong showings as retailers of all types upgraded their units.
The market is not without challenges for 2016, however. According to the study, the refugee crisis, lower oil prices, and terrorism concerns are slowing retail expansion throughout the Middle East, Russia, and parts of Africa resulting in a contraction of adoption of new systems. Despite these challenges, the market is still expected to have solid growth for 2016 and beyond.
The EMEA POS Terminal Study tracks the shipments and installed base of PC-Based POS Terminals in the Europe/Middle East/Africa market with breakouts for Germany, France, UK, Italy, Benelux, Scandinavia, Spain, Austria/Switzerland, Russia, and other EMEA regions. Data for individual retail segments is also included for each country.
IHL has been tracking the Retail POS Market in detail for the past 18 years to highlight key trends and market forces affecting the buying decisions of retailers in each segment and determine the trends and forecasts for this market.