Smartphone Sales Grew 74 Percent year on year says Gartner
Posted by Seth Planck
August 11th, 2011 at 10:23 PM Filed Under Latest News, Press Release
If you thought smartphone sales had peaked, your were wrong – they, in fact, grew a whopping 74% year-on-year according to Gartner
Phew, just when you thought there was nothing left to speculate on, we find that Gartner has been at it again, giving us statistics to analyze, ponder and argue over as to their real world meanings. With more people in the world using mobile devices than those who have running water, you can imagine it’s big business. In big business, we see winners and losers and many industry insiders wait with either excitement or dread for these reports to hit the media. Gartner today reported that mobile device sales grew 16.5% compared to the second quarter last year. That’s 428.7 million units in the second quarter of 2011. Mobile devices in general are a mature market now and a 16.5% increase in a globally bad economy is certainly news for celebration if you happen to be a market winning mobile device manufacturer.
Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users by Vendor in 2Q11 (Thousands of Units)
As you can see from the table above, despite its troubles Nokia is still number one taking 22.8% of the market and Samsung nipping at its heels with 16.3%. How Nokia will fare with Microsoft is a pure matter of speculation at this point, but with the hot competition from Samsung and Apple it looks as if the WP7 business may take a little time to settle, so Nokia may have a rough year to come. Apple has had an amazing year yet again and has grown its market share from 2.4% to 4.6%. Apple is reputed to be launching a more cost effective iPhone this fall and that is likely to push the Cupertino company past LG this next year. However, smartphones currently only account for 25% of all mobile device sales, but that is expected to change.
Gartner shows how smartphone adoption is going through the roof
Sales of smartphones were up 74 percent year-on-year and accounted for 25 percent of overall sales in the second quarter of 2011, up from 17 percent in the second quarter of 2010. Gartner feels Android’s rapid growth is due in part to growth in entry level smartphones. There is no doubting that Android’s impressive 26.2% gain year-over-year represents the OS eating into Symbian’s old territory. What remains to be seen is whether or not WP7 will take back some of that share this next year in behalf of Nokia. Android is now the number one mobile OS in the world and that may well explain why everyone and their mothers are trying to sue Google and its partners to curtail its rapid dominance.
“Smartphone sales continued to rise at the expense of feature phones,” said Roberta Cozza, Principal Research Analyst at Gartner. “Consumers in mature markets are choosing entry-level and midrange Android smartphones over feature phones, partly due to carriers’ and manufacturers’ promotions.” However, replacement sales in Western Europe showed signs of fatigue as smartphone sales declined quarter-on-quarter.
Worldwide Smartphone Sales to End Users by Operating System in 2Q11 (Thousands of Units)
| Operating System | 2Q11 Units | 2Q11 Market Share (%) | 2Q10 Units | 2Q10 Market Share (%) |
| Android | 46,775.9 | 43.4 | 10,652.7 | 17.2 |
| Symbian | 23,853.2 | 22.1 | 25,386.8 | 40.9 |
| iOS | 19,628.8 | 18.2 | 8,743.0 | 14.1 |
| Research In Motion | 12,652.3 | 11.7 | 11,628.8 | 18.7 |
| Bada | 2,055.8 | 1.9 | 577.0 | 0.9 |
| Microsoft | 1,723.8 | 1.6 | 3,058.8 | 4.9 |
| Others | 1,050.6 | 1.0 | 2,010.9 | 3.2 |
Total | 107,740.4 | 100.0 | 62,058.1 | 100.0 |
RIM slipped 7% to now only control 11.7% of the market, and as expected, Apple gained 4.1% of global smartphone sales. Even Bada beat out any Windows operating system which does make you wonder why Nokia put all its eggs in one basket and gave up on both Symbian and the much loved MeeGo Open Source OS.
Whichever way you look at it, there has been some major shifts over the last twelve months in mobile devices with distinct winners and losers. On an individual company basis for us, ZTE have the winning formula of cheap Android smartphones and we expect to see them move up the list further in quarters to come. Maybe their success will be at RIM, Nokia’s and LG’s expense who are all on the slide.
Gartner Says Sales of Mobile Devices in Second Quarter of 2011 Grew 16.5 Percent Year-on-Year; Smartphone Sales Grew 74 Percent
ZTE Became Fifth-Largest Mobile Phone Manufacturer and RIM Dropped to No. 6
Egham, UK, August 11, 2011—
Worldwide sales of mobile devices to end users totaled 428.7 million units in the second quarter of 2011, a 16.5 percent increase from the second quarter of 2010, according to Gartner, Inc. (see Table 1).
The channel built up stock at the end of the first quarter of 2011 in preparation of possible component shortages following the Japanese earthquake. As a result, sell-in demand slowed in the second quarter of 2011 to 421.1 million units, a 4.4 percent decrease from the previous quarter.
Sales of smartphones were up 74 percent year-on-year and accounted for 25 percent of overall sales in the second quarter of 2011, up from 17 percent in the second quarter of 2010.
“Smartphone sales continued to rise at the expense of feature phones,” said Roberta Cozza, principal research analyst at Gartner. “Consumers in mature markets are choosing entry-level and midrange Android smartphones over feature phones, partly due to carriers’ and manufacturers’ promotions.” However, replacement sales in Western Europe showed signs of fatigue as smartphone sales declined quarter-on-quarter.
Table 1
Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users by Vendor in 2Q11 (Thousands of Units)
Source: Gartner (August 2011)
In smartphones, Nokia’s sales into the channel in the second quarter of 2011 were low. This was partly due to a very competitive market that deflated demand for Symbian, but also to inventory management issues in Europe and China in particular. The channel bought less and worked hard to reduce stock levels, partly by cutting prices on older products. These factors reduced Nokia’s average selling price for smartphones, compared to the first quarter of 2011. “The sales efforts of the channel, combined with Nokia’s greater concentration in retail and distributors’ sales, saw Nokia destock more than 9 million units overall and 5 million smartphones, helping it hold on to its position as the leading smartphone manufacturer by volume,” said Ms. Cozza. “However, we will not see a repeat of this performance in the third quarter of 2011, as Nokia’s channel is pretty lean.”
Samsung achieved strong growth in sales of mobile devices. For example, the Galaxy S II sold well, and this model went on to chalk up 5 million sales by the end of July. A strong performance in the smartphone market helped Samsung increase its market share, to become the third-largest smartphone vendor. However, its overall share dropped year-on-year, and grew only marginally quarter-on-quarter, mainly due to Samsung’s weaker presence in more price-sensitive market segments.
Apple continued to exceed expectations, even though the iPhone 4 will soon be replaced by a new model. Part of its growth came from the 42 new carriers and 15 new countries that it entered in the second quarter of 2011, which brought its total coverage to 100 countries. This expansion caused its inventory to grow a little by the end of the second quarter of 2011, when sales to end users stood at 19.6 million units. In mainland China, Apple is the seventh-largest mobile phone vendor and the third-largest smartphone vendor.
Research In Motion’s (RIM’s) share of the smartphone market declined to 12 percent in the second quarter of 2011, from 19 percent a year ago. Also, the company lost its No. 5 position in the worldwide ranking of mobile device vendors to ZTE. Demand for RIM’s devices in the second quarter was impaired by an ageing portfolio and delays in shipping products. In the coming quarters RIM will have to deal with increased competition to its messaging offering and manage a platform migration from BlackBerry 7 to QNX.
Google and Apple are the obvious winners in the smartphone ecosystem. The combined share of iOS and Android in the smartphone operating system (OS) market doubled to nearly 62 percent in the second quarter of 2011, up from just over 31 percent in the corresponding period of 2010 (see Table 2). Gartner analysts observed that these two OSs have the usability that consumers enjoy, the apps that consumers feel they need, and increasingly a portfolio of services delivered by the platform owner as well.
Table 2
Worldwide Smartphone Sales to End Users by Operating System in 2Q11 (Thousands of Units)
Operating System | 2Q11 Units | 2Q11 Market Share (%) | 2Q10 Units | 2Q10 Market Share (%) |
| Android | 46,775.9 | 43.4 | 10,652.7 | 17.2 |
| Symbian | 23,853.2 | 22.1 | 25,386.8 | 40.9 |
| iOS | 19,628.8 | 18.2 | 8,743.0 | 14.1 |
| Research In Motion | 12,652.3 | 11.7 | 11,628.8 | 18.7 |
| Bada | 2,055.8 | 1.9 | 577.0 | 0.9 |
| Microsoft | 1,723.8 | 1.6 | 3,058.8 | 4.9 |
| Others | 1,050.6 | 1.0 | 2,010.9 | 3.2 |
Total | 107,740.4 | 100.0 | 62,058.1 | 100.0 |
Source: Gartner (August 2011)
“We expect manufacturers and distributors to remain cautious about raising their stock levels in the second half of 2011, following the recent uncertainty on the world financial markets,” said Annette Zimmermann, principal research analyst at Gartner. Gartner expects sales of mobile devices to grow around 12 percent in 2011.
For more information, see the Gartner report “Market Share: Mobile Communication Devices by Region and Country, 2Q11” which is available on Gartner’s website athttp://www.gartner.com/resId=1764117.
Contacts:
Christy Pettey
Gartner
+1 408 468 8312
christy.pettey@gartner.com
Laurence Goasduff
Gartner
+ 44 1784 267 195
laurence.goasduff@gartner.com
About Gartner:
Gartner, Inc. (NYSE: IT) is the world’s leading information technology research and advisory company. Gartner delivers the technology-related insight necessary for its clients to make the right decisions, every day. From CIOs and senior IT leaders in corporations and government agencies, to business leaders in high-tech and telecom enterprises and professional services firms, to technology investors, Gartner is a valuable partner to 60,000 clients in 11,500 distinct organizations. Through the resources of Gartner Research, Gartner Executive Programs, Gartner Consulting and Gartner Events, Gartner works with every client to research, analyze and interpret the business of IT within the context of their individual role. Founded in 1979, Gartner is headquartered in Stamford, Connecticut, U.S.A., and has 4,500 associates, including 1,250 research analysts and consultants, and clients in 85 countries. For more information, visit www.gartner.com. Gartner