Samsung increased its leadership in the mobile phone market even as worldwide mobile phone sales decreased. According to Gartner’s latest numbers, mobile phone sales to end users were down 3.1% in 3Q12 compared to 3Q11 with approximately 428 million units sold. Currently, Samsung has a 22.9% market share, totaling almost 98 million units in the third quarter of 2012 (see Table 1), up 18.6% year-on-year.
Smartphone sales have also increased, accounting for 39.6% of total mobile phone sales, rising to 169.2 million units in the third quarter of 2012, which is an increase of 46.9% from the third quarter of 2011.
The smartphone market was dominated by Apple and Samsung. Both vendors together control 46.5% of the smartphone market. Nokia slipped from No. 3 in the second quarter of 2012 to No. 7 in smartphone sales in the third quarter of 2012. RIM moved to the No. 3 spot with HTC not far behind, at No. 4.
Another positive point noted by Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner, was the improved demand in both mature and emerging markets as mobile phone sales increased sequentially after two consecutive quarters of decline.
Gupta pointed out that in China, sales of mobile phones grew driven by smartphone sales, while demand for feature phones remained weak.
According to Gupta, Samsung mobile phones sales continued to accelerate, pushed by the strong demand for Galaxy smartphones across different price points.
Apple sold 55 million smartphones in the third quarter of 2012. It commanded 32.5% of the global smartphone market in the third quarter of 2012.
Regarding operating systems (OS) in the smartphone market, Android continued to increase its market share, up 19.9 percentage points in the third quarter of 2012. Although RIM lost market share, it climbed to the No. 3 position as Symbian nears the end of its life cycle.
With the launch of iPhone 5, Gartner analysts expect the iOS share will grow quickly in the fourth quarter of 2012 because users in many markets waited to purchase replacements phones until the wider release of the iPhone 5.
Windows phone share weakened year-on-year as the Windows Phone 8 launch dampened demand of Windows Phone 7 devices.
