Samsung, meanwhile, forges ahead with strong sales growth driven by sales of its Galaxy Android smartphone, maintaining and even extending its quarter by quarter sales lead over rivals Apple and Nokia.
Worldwide sales of mobile phones to end users reached 419 million units in the second quarter this year - a 2.3 percent decline from the second quarter of 2011, according to Gartner’s latest report, with smartphone sales accounting for 36.7 percent of total mobile phone sales and achieving growth in the second quarter this year of 42.7 percent.
Despite the dominance of Apple’s iPhone, consumers continue to snap up Samsung’s mobile phones with sales remaining very strong, up 29.5 percent in the second quarter this year from the same quarter in 2011.
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"High-profile smartphone launches from key manufacturers such as the anticipated Apple iPhone 5, along with Chinese manufacturers pushing 3G and preparing for major device launches in the second half of 2012, will drive the smartphone market upward. However, feature phones will continue to see pressure," Gupta says.
In the second quarter of this year, Gartner reports that Samsung's mobile phone sales remained very strong and the company managed to extend its lead over both Apple and Nokia quarter on quarter.
Gupta says the second quarter growth in Samsung mobile sales was driven by record sales of Galaxy smartphones, meaning smartphones now account for 50.4 percent of all Samsung mobile devices, or 45.6 million units.
“Demand for the new Galaxy S3 was particularly strong, exceeding Samsung's own expectations, with a reported 10 million units reached in the two months after its release. The Galaxy S3 was the best-selling Android product in the quarter and could have been higher but for product shortages.
The momentum in iPhone sales in the early part of this year wained, with Gartner reporting that in the second quarter global consumer demand for the Apple iPhone weakened as sales fell 12.6 percent from the first quarter, but they have still shown healthy year-on-year growth of 47.4 percent.
According to Gupta, depending on the exact launch date of the new iPhone, Apple might experience another weaker-than-usual quarter in the third quarter of 2012, “while Apple will be ready to take advantage of the strong holiday sales in North America and Western Europe that have historically remained immune to economic pressure.”
"Samsung and Apple continued to dominate the smartphone market, together taking about half the market share, and widening the gap to other manufacturers. No other smartphone vendors had share close to 10 percent.
"In the race to be top smartphone manufacturer in 2012, Samsung has consistently increased its lead over Apple, and its open OS market share increased to one-and-a-half times that of Apple in the second quarter of 2012."
For the once-dominant Nokia, its mobile phone sales declined 14.8 percent in the second quarter of this year, and Gupta says the company is “battling fiercely with white-box and new emerging device manufacturers to defend its feature phones sales.”
“Nokia succeeded, to a certain extent, in winning feature phone market share as its sales grew quarter-on-quarter. While posting sequential growth in the feature phone market, Nokia's Lumia devices continue to struggle to find a place in consumers' minds as a replacement for Android.”
However, Gupta says that declining smartphone sales is worsening Nokia's overall position, as it had already lost the number one position to Samsung in the previous quarter and is facing “reduced profitability due to continuous declining sales of premium smartphones."
In the smartphone OS market, Gartner reports that Android extended its lead with an increase of 20.7 percentage points in market share in the second quarter of 2012, and while Apple's iOS market share slightly grew year over year (0.6 percent), it declined 3.7 percentage points quarter on quarter, as users postponed their upgrade decisions in most markets ahead of the upcoming launch of the iPhone 5.
Gartner analysts say the arrival of the iPhone 5 should provide the greatest upgrade opportunity yet as the expected new design with a larger screen and likely other stylistic changes to the form factor will certainly make a strong case for iPhone 4 users to upgrade.
Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users by Vendor in 2Q12 (Thousands of Units)
|
Company |
2Q12 Units |
2Q12 Market Share (%) |
2Q11 Units |
2Q11 Market Share (%) |
|
Samsung |
90,432.1 |
21.6 |
69,827.6 |
16.3 |
|
Nokia |
83,420.1 |
19.9 |
97,869.3 |
22.8 |
|
Apple |
28,935.0 |
6.9 |
19,628.8 |
4.6 |
|
ZTE |
17,936.4 |
4.3 |
13,070.2 |
3.0 |
|
LG Electronics |
14,345.4 |
3.4 |
24,420.8 |
5.7 |
|
Huawei Device |
10,894.2 |
2.6 |
9,026.1 |
2.1 |
|
TCL Communications |
9,355.7 |
2.2 |
7,938.9 |
1.9 |
|
HTC |
9,301.2 |
2.2 |
11,016.1 |
2.6 |
|
Motorola |
9,163.2 |
2.2 |
10,221.4 |
2.4 |
|
Research In Motion |
7,991.2 |
1.9 |
12,652.3 |
3.0 |
|
Others |
137,233.4 |
32.8 |
152,989.70 |
35.7 |
|
Total |
419,007.90 |
100.0 |
428,661.15 |
100.0 |
Source: Gartner (August 2012)
Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users by Operating System in 2Q12 (Thousands of Units)
|
Operating System |
2Q12 Units |
2Q12 Market Share (%) |
2Q11 Units |
2Q11 Market Share (%) |
|
Android |
98,529.3 |
64.1 |
46,775.9 |
43.4 |
|
iOS |
28,935.0 |
18.8 |
19,628.8 |
18.2 |
|
Symbian |
9,071.5 |
5.9 |
23,853.2 |
22.1 |
|
Research In Motion |
7,991.2 |
5.2 |
12,652.3 |
11.7 |
|
Bada |
4,208.8 |
2.7 |
2,055.8 |
1.9 |
|
Microsoft |
4,087.0 |
2.7 |
1,723.8 |
1.6 |
|
Others |
863.3 |
0.6 |
1,050.6 |
1.0 |
|
Total |
153,686.1 |
100.0 |
107,740.4 |
100.0 |
Source: Gartner (August 2012)
