Samsung Leads Global Smartphone Market
Samsung Leads Global Smartphone Market by UCStrategies Staff
According to Gartner's report released on Wednesday this week, Samsung, the Korean tech giant, remained the top smartphone following the third quarter, extending its lead over rival Apple.
The Android-based Galaxy smartphones have had very strong sales which has allowed it to move ahead and away in the global smartphone market; it already accounts for 32.5 percent of the worldwide market share.
The sale of a vast 55 million smartphones during the third quarter (an increase from 45.6 million in the last quarter) can be contrasted against Apple's 23.6 million iPhone sales. However, Gartner anticipates a surge in sales for the latter company, especially with the ensuing holiday season and the recent release of the new iPhone 5.
Anshul Gupta, a principal research analyst at Gartner, stated: “We saw inventory built up into the channel as Apple prepared for the coming holiday season, global expansions and the launch into China in the fourth quarter of 2012. With iPhone 5 launching in more territories in the fourth quarter of 2012, including China, and the upcoming holiday season, Gartner analysts expect Apple will have its traditionally strongest quarter.”
In the third quarter, Apple and Samsung led the smartphone market, and held 46.5 percent of the market share. This “[left] a handful of vendors fighting over a distant third spot," according to Gartner.
The Gartner figures represent mobile sales in general, rather than the more specific smartphone sale numbers. The Finnish handset maker Nokia, on the other hand, fell rather drastically from third to seventh place in its third quarter in relation to the smartphone market share. 7.2 million smartphones were shipped in the last quarter, and the company is expected to see a rise in sales following the recent release of the new Windows Phone 8-based Lumia 920.
Research In Motion which makes BlackBerry which has been struggling recently, moved up into third place, and HTC of China followed close-by in fourth position.
Generally speaking, there has been a huge growth in smartphone sales of up to 46.9 percent; this contrasts greatly with the third quarter one year ago. It was also stated that Google's Android, in the third quarter, was the most widespread mobile OS with 72.4 percent market share, and was followed at 13.9 percent by the Apple iOS. (CY) Link