Monday Morning Impact – October 26

Worldwide PC shipments fell 20.1% year over year in Q3 2026 to 62.7 million units, according to preliminary results from IDC Research (IDC), the second consecutive decline and a deeper one than the 3.8% drop in Q2. Shipments also slipped 9.1% sequentially, upending the usual pattern in which Q3 outpaces Q2. Continued supply constraints and the inventory pull-in earlier in the year, as vendors and channels rushed to stock up ahead of memory-driven price hikes, left the quarter with little demand to draw on.

“What we’re seeing is the result of the strong first half pull-in. Vendors and channels loaded up on inventory early in the year to get ahead of price hikes, and that has thrown off the usual seasonality, where Q3 is typically larger than Q2,” said Jitesh Ubrani, research director for consumer devices at IDC. “Channels are now worried about carrying too much inventory into a market where high prices are suppressing demand. That could translate into promotions and some short-term relief for consumers, but we don’t expect pricing anywhere near what it was a year ago. Prices will remain elevated. With macro conditions worsening, the risk is that the outlook for the next few quarters gets worse before it gets better.”

Channel concern over high inventory and soft demand at elevated prices could bring promotions in the near term, but pricing will stay well above year-ago levels, according to IDC. The bigger risk is macro: conditions have worsened since last quarter, and a weaker economic backdrop could push demand lower and darken the outlook for the remainder of 2026 and into 2027.

The pain was not evenly shared. Lenovo, HP Inc, and Dell Technologies all fell faster than the market and together ceded 4.2 points of share as they were likely facing the effects of pull-in from earlier in the year.

Channel Impact^®
Channels are concerned about high inventory and low demand, so promotions are possible. However, prices are expected to remain elevated and well above where they were at the same time last year. Worsening macro conditions are the main concern. A weaker economy could soften demand further, and with prices still high and supply constrained, the outlook for the remainder of 2026 and going into 2027 could deteriorate.

Foresite Cybersecurity, a Kansas-based cloud security company, announced the expansion of its cloud security services to include Wiz, alongside its achievement of Premier tier in the Wiz Partner Alliance Services Program and participation in the Wiz Partner Alliance Managed Service Provider Program. The expansion builds on Foresite’s experience deploying and operating the Google Cloud security stack, helping enterprises connect cloud risk management with security operations.

Services include assessment, implementation and ongoing operations across the Wiz AI Application Protection Platform (AI-APP). Enterprises can engage Foresite to strengthen existing deployments, introduce new capabilities or manage day-to-day platform operations, with services tailored to their environment and priorities.

A central part of this approach is the integration of Wiz with Google Security Operations, connecting cloud risk findings and runtime detections with SOC investigation and response. Supporting services include 24/7 managed detection and response, combining automated investigation with practitioner oversight of response actions.

“The opportunity is to connect what teams know about cloud risk with how they investigate and respond to threats,” said Jeremy Hehl, Chief Evangelist at Foresite. “We’re building on our experience across Google Cloud security to help customers bring Wiz into that operating model, with the expertise to deploy it and the ongoing support to make it effective.”

“Wiz provides the context-driven cloud and AI security to protect everything organizations build and run,” said Andy Ritchie, Vice President, Global Channels and Alliances at Wiz. “Our partners are critical to delivering this value, and the Premier tier represents the absolute highest level of technical competency, training, and accreditation in the Wiz platform.”

Channel Impact^®
Foresite builds on its experience deploying and operating the Google Cloud security stack by extending that same approach to Wiz, now part of Google Cloud.