Market research firms IDC and Strategy Analytics put out their estimates of second-quarter smartphone marketshare and while the numbers were different, the bottom line was the same: Samsung led the world in smartphone shipments in the second quarter and No. 2 ranked Apple saw its lowest levels of shipment growth in a few years.
Even so, the two firms diverged on what the numbers meant for Apple. IDC called the shipments ?impressive,? while Strategy Analytics said the maker of the iPhone, which runs Apple?s iOS operating system, was ?at risk? of losing more share to rivals with smartphones that run Google?s Android OS.
First up, IDC. Thanks to new models of the Galaxy S, Samsung shipped 72.4 million smartphones, a 43.9 percent jump over last year, IDC said in a statement. That left Samsung with a 30.4 percent share of the market, down from 32.2 in 2012. (Click on the chart to see a bigger version).
Apple sold 31.2 million iPhones, a 20 percent gain from last year, and captured 13.1 percent of the market. That was down from 16.6 percent last year. The biggest winners in the quarter were No. 3-ranked LG and Lenovo, which was in fourth place: LG?s shipments rose nearly 109 percent, expanding its share to 5.1 percent from 3.7 percent, while Lenovo had an almost 131 percent gain in shipments, which gave it an 4.7 percent share of the market, up from 3.1 in the second quarter of 2012.
Overall, smartphone makers shipped a total of 237.9 million units in the second quarter, a 52 percent jump over the 156.2 million units sold last year, IDC said.
While Apple ?posted its second-lowest year-over-year iPhone growth rate in almost four years as some buyers presumably held off on iPhone purchases in advance of an expected next-generation device launch this fall,? IDC said Apple?s numbers were still ?impressive as its flagship iPhone 5 model, which has been in the market for three quarters, was faced with additional global competition in the form of Samsung?s Galaxy S4 and HTC?s critically-acclaimed One models. Apple?s growth is likely to accelerate globally assuming it launches a lower-cost iPhone and continues to penetrate prepaid markets in the quarters to come.?
Strategy Analytics, meanwhile, says that global smartphone shipments rose 47 percent to 229.6 million in the second quarter from 156.5 million units in the same quarter a year ago. That was the largest number of smartphones ever shipped in a single quarter, the research firm said, noting that smartphones accounted for 59 percent of all mobile phones shipped globally.
As for rankings, Samsung earned a 33 percent share of the market after shipping two times more smartphones than Apple. The South Korean company sold 76 million smartphones, up from 48.7 million in the second quarter of 2012. ?The flagship Galaxy S4 model experienced solid demand in China and worldwide and helped to lift volumes,? Neil Mawston, executive director of Strategy Analytics, said in?statement.
Apple had shipments of 31.2 million, up from 26 million last year, which gave it a 14 percent share of the market ? its lowest level since the second quarter of 2010. Strategy Analytics says LG was the ?star performer? after shipments rose to 12.1 million from 5.8 million, giving it a 5 percent share of the market.
?Apple grew just 20 percent annually during Q2 2013, which is less than half the overall smartphone industry average of 47 percent,? Mawston said. ?The current iPhone portfolio is under-performing and Apple is at risk of being trapped in a pincer movement between rival 3-inch Android models at the low-end and 5-inch Android models at the high-end.?
Impressive or at risk? Again, that seems to depend on whom you ask.
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