Jon Peddie Research reports that the add-in board GPU market has increased 30.9% over last quarter and 34.9% year-to-year, largely thanks to the recent cryptocurrency mining craze.
Regardless of the exact numbers, it’s obvious to anyone that’s checked graphics card prices recently that something unusual is happening. JPR states that Q2 usually sees a “significant drop” in the market (average -9.8%), with the most action happening around the holiday season. This Q2, the market has increased for the first time in nine years. This is despite general PC market decline as demand for the industry’s bread-and-butter general purpose (non-gaming) PCs has dropped.
This is good news for AIB partners, as JPR estimates that 2.1 billion AIBs will have been shipped by the end of 2017. Still, it’s hard not to see this as a bubble, and the lasting effects of the mining boom remain to be seen. For now, interest in Ethereum and cryptocurrency doesn’t seem to be dying down.
JPR also reports a marketshare growth for AMD, whom JPR indicates as moving from 27.5% marketshare (last quarter) to 29.4% marketshare this quarter. NVidia holds 70.6% marketshare. Matrox is nowhere to be found.
- Patrick Lathan