Stiff competition
The total mobile device market grew a more modest 13.8 percent. year-on-year, in Q2, but that's still not bad. Less positive for the industry was evidence that at least some of this growth was due to aggressive pricing, especially in the increasingly commoditised feature-phone sector, where Samsung and LG paid for market share increases with lower margins.
"Although the mobile communication devices market showed double-digit growth this quarter, average selling prices (ASPs) were lower than expected and margins fell," said Milanesi. "We attribute the decline in ASPs to a stronger dollar, a depreciating euro, and intense competition that drove price adjustments and changes to the product mix."
The growth in market share for the Koreans seems to have slowed; revealing their relative weakness in smartphones. In contrast, HTC jumped into the top ten on the back of its Android smartphones, but Motorola will be disappointed with such a fall in its overall share. The strength of the Chinese market is revealed by the emergence of G'Five.
Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users in 2Q10 (Thousands of Units)
|
Company |
2Q10 Units |
2Q10 Market Share (%) |
2Q09 Units |
2Q09 Market Share (%) |
|
Nokia |
111,473.8 |
34.2 |
105,413.4 |
36.8 |
|
Samsung |
65,328.2 |
20.1 |
55,430.1 |
19.3 |
|
LG |
29,366.7 |
9.0 |
30,497.0 |
10.7 |
|
Research In Motion |
11,228.8 |
3.4 |
7,678.9 |
2.7 |
|
Sony Ericsson |
11,008.5 |
3.4 |
13,574.3 |
4.7 |
|
Motorola |
9,109.4 |
2.8 |
15,947.8 |
5.6 |
|
Apple |
8,743.0 |
2.7 |
5,434.7 |
1.9 |
|
HTC |
5,908.8 |
1.8 |
2,471.0 |
0.9 |
|
ZTE |
5,545.8 |
1.7 |
3,697.9 |
1.3 |
|
G'Five |
5,208.6 |
1.6 |
NA |
NA |
|
Others |
62,635.2 |
19.30 |
45,977.2 |
16.1 |
|
Total |
325,556.8 |
100.0 |
286,122.3 |
100.0 |
Source: Gartner (August 2010)
