Smartphones finally outsold feature phones globally during the second quarter of this year, with Android taking a 79% share of the market, according to new research. The study, from Gartner, found worldwide smartphone sales hit 225 million last quarter, a 46.5% leap from the same quarter last year. Over the same time, feature phone sales […]
Smartphones finally outsold feature phones globally during the second quarter of this year, with Android taking a 79% share of the market, according to new research.
The study, from Gartner, found worldwide smartphone sales hit 225 million last quarter, a 46.5% leap from the same quarter last year.
Over the same time, feature phone sales fell to 210 million, a decline of 21%. Smartphones saw their biggest growth in Asia/Pacific at 74.1%, Latin America at 55.7%, and Eastern Europe at 31.6%.
Samsung vs. Apple
Gartner said Apple saw a significant drop in the average selling price (ASP) of its devices in Q2, with its ASP declining to the lowest figure registered by Apple since the iPhone’s launch in 2007.
“While Apple’s [declining] ASP demonstrates the need for a new flagship model, it is risky for Apple to introduce a new lower-priced model too,” commented Gartner analyst Anshul Gupta in a statement. ”Although the possible new lower-priced device may be priced similarly to the iPhone 4 at $300 to $400, the potential for cannibalisation will be much greater than what is seen today with the iPhone 4. Despite being seen as the less expensive sibling of the flagship product, it would represent a new device with the hype of the marketing associated with it.”
Operating systems
Android’s global marketshare in Q2 was a staggering 79% according to Gartner, up from 64.2% in the year ago quarter., lead by feature phone switchers.
Apple’s iOS remained in second place as its share dropped to 14.2 % from 18.8 %.
Taken together, Android and iOS took a 93.2% global marketshare in the quarter — underlining why developers opt to support these two platform first and foremost, and generally require incentives to expend effort elsewhere.
Windows overtakes Blackberry
Windows Phone has swiped third place from BlackBerry among all mobile smartphone platforms, Gartner said in a report out Wednesday.
For the second quarter, Microsoft’s mobile OS scored a market share of 3.3%, up from 2.6% in the prior year’s quarter. Shipments of Windows Phone handsets jumped to 7.4 million from 4 million a year ago.
Over the same time, BlackBerry saw its market share plummet to 2.7% from 5.2%, while shipments dipped to 6.1 million from 7.9 million.
Earlier this week, the beleaguered BlackBerry said it is now considering “strategic alternatives” that could include a sale of the company.
“Smartphones accounted for 51.8% of mobile phone sales in the second quarter of 2013, resulting in smartphone sales surpassing feature phone sales for the first time,” Gartner research analyst Anshul Gupta said in a statement.
Overall, mobile phone sales reached 435 million last quarter, up 3.6% from the prior year.
Source: www.gartner.com
