FRAMINGHAM, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Holiday seasonality, strong end-user demand, and a deep selection of models propelled smartphone volumes to a new record level for the quarter and for the year. According to preliminary data from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, smartphone vendors shipped a total of 375.2 million units during the fourth quarter of 2014 (4Q14), resulting in 28.2% growth when compared to the 292.7 million units shipped in 4Q13 and 11.9% sequential growth above the 335.3 million units shipped in 3Q14. For the full year, the worldwide smartphone market saw a total of 1,301.1 million units shipped, up 27.6% from the 1,019.4 million units shipped in 2013.
"Most of the industry expected an extremely strong holiday quarter from Apple, especially with regards to the iPhone. However, worldwide shipments of 74.5 million units beat everyone's expectations," said Ryan Reith, Program Director with IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker. "Beyond the record-setting quarter, a few impressive things stand out with regard to Apple. First, at a time when average selling prices (ASPs) for smartphone are rapidly declining, Apple managed to increase its reported ASPs in the fourth quarter due to higher-cost new models. Second, the growth of iPhone sales in both the U.S., which is considered a saturated market, and China, which presents the dual challenges of strong local competitors and serious price sensitivity, were remarkable. Sustaining this growth and higher ASPs a year from now could prove challenging, but right now there is no question that Apple is leading the way."
Apple and Samsung are tied as world’s top smartphone vendors
In 2013 IDC talked about the smartphone industry topping the 1 billion unit milestone, and while year-over-year growth did slow from 40.5% in 2013 to 27.6% in 2014, the market clearly still has legs. This past year volumes surpassed 1.3 billion units and the vendor scenario has witnessed continued shakeups. Growth is forecast to decline to the mid-teens in 2015, but opportunity exists as much of the world's population is either not a wireless subscriber or has yet to move to a smartphone.
"That the worldwide smartphone market grew by 27.6% in 2014 is noteworthy, but it also represents a significant slowdown compared to 2013," said Ramon Llamas, Research Manager with IDC's Mobile Phone team. "Mature markets have become increasingly dependent on replacement purchases rather than first-time buyers, which has contributed to slower growth. In emerging markets, first-time buyers continue to provide a lot of market momentum, but the focus has shifted toward low-cost devices, creating a different dynamic for both global and local vendors.
"What remains to be seen is how the vendors beyond Samsung and Apple will assert themselves," added Llamas. "With Lenovo acquiring Motorola, and Xiaomi having greater aspirations beyond China, the competitive pressure will come more from below and less from above. This will make the smartphone race continuously competitive as 2015 shapes up."
Samsung remained the leader in the worldwide smartphone market for the quarter and for the year, but nonetheless experienced continued competitive realities. With increased pressure in the high-end from Apple, and at the low-end to midrange from Chinese manufacturers Xiaomi, Huawei, ZTE, and others, Samsung faces a multi-front battle. To this end, Samsung has streamlined its operations and product portfolio to become more competitive in the market.
Huawei returned to the list of top 5 worldwide vendors, emphasizing its midrange and high-end smartphones (P Series and Mate Series respectively), and saw continued success with its Honor line. Huawei attributed its 2014 success to improved brand awareness and overall customer experience, which it will look to evolve even further in 2015.
In addition to the table above, an interactive graphic showing worldwide unit shipments for the top 5 smartphone vendors over the previous five quarters is available here. The chart is intended for public use in online news articles and social media. Instructions on how to embed this graphic can be found by viewing this press release on IDC.com.
Despite the challenging environment, vendor positioning did not change from last quarter. Samsung held the top spot with a 21.2% share, Apple came in second with a 17.2% share, while Xiaomi came in third with a 13.4% share. vivo and OPPO ended the quarter tied* for the fourth position, each with 8.6% share. Except for Apple, all the top vendors suffered year-on-year declines. However, while Samsung and Xiaomi registered single-digit declines, vivo and OPPO continued to suffer high double-digit decreases.
Apple shipped 78.3 million smartphones worldwide and captured 18 percent marketshare in Q4 2016, rising a steady 5 percent annually from 74.8 million units in Q4 2015. This was the iPhone's best performance for over a year, as Apple capitalized on Samsung's recent missteps. Samsung shipped 77.5 million smartphones worldwide in Q4 2016, dipping 5 percent annually from 81.3 million units in Q4 2015.
The COVID-19 pandemic continued to impact the global mobile phone industry, as worldwide sales of smartphones to end users totaled 295 million units, a decline of 20.4% in the second quarter of 2020, according to Gartner, Inc.
Even with increased demand, smartphone sales in China declined 7% in the second quarter of 2020, with nearly 94 million smartphones sold. India which adopted rigorous lockdowns (even restricting e-commerce) recorded the worst smartphone sales decline (-46%) among the top five countries in the world.
Samsung and Apple dominate the smartphone industry globally. Combined, they control more than half the total market share on the planet. In most regions of the world, either Apple or Samsung is the top vendor. While Apple leads in its home market of North America, Samsung tends to lead elsewhere. In this report, Flurry looks at the global market share by active user base. While most market share analyses estimate device shipments or sales, Flurry directly measures what phones are in use today. As a result, our analysis shows market share based on active devices, or true install base, which we believe is a more meaningful view of market share.
Huawei has deployed its products and services in more than 170 countries and areas.[7] It overtook Ericsson in 2012 as the largest telecommunications equipment manufacturer in the world,[8] and overtook Apple in 2018 as the second-largest manufacturer of smartphones in the world, behind Samsung Electronics.[9] In 2018, Huawei reported annual revenue of US$108.5 billion.[10] In July 2020, Huawei surpassed Samsung and Apple in the number of phones shipped worldwide for the first time.[11] This was primarily due to a drop in Samsung's global sales in the second quarter of 2020, owing to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.[11][12][13]
In 2019, Huawei reported revenue of US$122 billion.[77] By the second quarter of 2020, Huawei had become the world's top smartphone seller, overtaking Samsung for the first time.[11] In 2021, Huawei was ranked the second-largest R&D investor in the world by the EU Joint Research Centre (JRC) in its EU Industrial R&D Investment Scoreboard[78] and ranked fifth in the world in US patents according to a report by Fairview Research's IFI Claims Patent Services.[79]
However, heavy international sanctions saw Huawei's revenues drop by 32% in the 2021 third quarter.[80] Linghao Bao, an analyst at policy research firm Trivium China said the "communications giant went from being the second-largest smartphone maker in the world, after Samsung, to essentially dead."[81] By the end of third quarter in 2022, Huawei revenue had dropped a further 19.7% since the beginning of the year.[82]
In July 2003, Huawei established their handset department and by 2004, Huawei shipped their first phone, the C300. The U626 was Huawei's first 3G phone in June 2005 and in 2006, Huawei launched the first Vodafone-branded 3G handset, the V710. The U8220 was Huawei's first Android smartphone and was unveiled in MWC 2009. At CES 2012, Huawei introduced the Ascend range starting with the Ascend P1 S. At MWC 2012, Huawei launched the Ascend D1. In September 2012, Huawei launched their first 4G ready phone, the Ascend P1 LTE. At CES 2013, Huawei launched the Ascend D2 and the Ascend Mate. At MWC 2013, the Ascend P2 was launched as the world's first LTE Cat4 smartphone. In June 2013, Huawei launched the Ascend P6 and in December 2013, Huawei introduced Honor as a subsidiary independent brand in China. At CES 2014, Huawei launched the Ascend Mate2 4G in 2014 and at MWC 2014, Huawei launched the MediaPad X1 tablet and Ascend G6 4G smartphone. Other launched in 2014 included the Ascend P7 in May 2014, the Ascend Mate7, the Ascend G7 and the Ascend P7 Sapphire Edition as China's first 4G smartphone with a sapphire screen.[120]
A new report from Amnesty International claims that some of the world's biggest technology and automotive companies are failing to check whether cobalt mined by children is being used in their products. Its joint investigation with African Resources Watch (Afrewatch) suggests that Apple, Huawei, Lenovo, Microsoft, Samsung and Sony are linked to the sale of cobalt used in lithium batteries in smartphones, notebooks and tablets, from mines in Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) where children as young as seven are put to work.
Samsung (NASDAQOTH: SSNLF) and Apple (AAPL -1.76%) are the world's largest smartphone vendors. Samsung's Galaxy brand and Apple's iPhone are ubiquitous. Combined, the firms produced more than one-third of all smartphones sold globally in the second quarter, according to research firm IDC. In terms of total numbers, Samsung's Galaxy brand has sold more units, but it's not as simple as it may otherwise appear.
Which Galaxies count?For Samsung's Galaxy, the situation is a bit different and not nearly as straightforward. Samsung is a massive business, with many different segments. Management will occasionally give figures, but Samsung doesn't reliably break out its smartphone sales. Third-party research firms provide the best estimate of Samsung's smartphone sales, which have dwarfed iPhone since 2011, when Samsung became the world's largest smartphone vendor. 2ff7e9595c
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