Growth of the US market for home personal computers will hit the buffers this year and sales could even begin shrinking by 1998 as the market matures, Dataquest Inc suggests. It believes growth of the US home computer market will be in single digits in 1996 at only 8%, a shuddering application of the brakes after explosive 42% growth in 1994 and a nearly 22% jump last year. Dataquest expects about 33% of US homes to own a computer by the end of 1996, up from 29% in 1995, with penetration advancing to 37.7% in 1999. The number of new units shipped to homes in the US may peak in 1997 at just below 8m then drift lower in 1998 before climbing to 8.4m in 1999 it says.
