14 DAY TRIAL // The mobile phone market reportedly showed some recovery during the fourth quarter of the last year, after registering a series of slow quarters during 2009. According to a recently published research from Strategy Analytics, the handset shipments in the time frame went up by 10 percent when compared to the fourth quarter of the previous year. Moreover, the research firm also notes that Q4 2009 was the first positive quarter for the mobile phone market since Q3 2008, which shows that the industry is moving out of recession.
“Global mobile handset shipments reached 324 million units during Q4 2009, rising 10 percent from 294 million in Q4 2008. The ten-percent increase was the handset market’s first quarter of positive growth since Q3 2008, signaling an end to the industry’s recession which first began during Q4 2008 and lasted for four quarters,” stated Bonny Joy, senior analyst at Strategy Analytics.
According to Strategy Analytics’ Q4 2009 Global Handset Market Share Update report, Nokia remained the leader on the market with a number of 126.9 million units shipped in Q4 and with a market share of 39.1%, followed by Samsung with shipments of 69.0 million units and a market share of 21.3%. LG Electronics ended the quarter on the third place, with 33.9 million units sold and 10.5% market share, followed by Sony Ericsson on the forth, with 14.6 million units shipped and 4.5% market share, and Motorola with 12.0 million units and 3.7% market share.
Other findings from the report include: - Samsung shipped a record 69.0 million handsets worldwide during the fourth quarter of 2009, up an above-average 31% from 52.8 million units a year earlier. Samsung maintained its global marketshare at an impressive level of 21%. The company surpassed 200 million units during the full-year for the first time in its history; - Motorola and Sony Ericsson have been the highest-profile casualties of the handset recession, each shedding several points of global marketshare over the past 18 months. Both firms developed inadequate 3G handset portfolios, enabling rivals like LG and Apple to seduce operators with more attractive offerings during 2009; - Apple shipped a record 8.7 million iPhones worldwide in Q4 2009, for a healthy 2.7% marketshare. Apple recently unveiled the iPad multimedia tablet, which will complement the iPhone but may struggle to match the iPhone’s sizeable volumes.
Year on year, Nokia saw its market share going down to 38.1%, with only 431.8 million units shipped in 2009, yet the entire market is said to have diminished, reaching a total of 1131.9 million units, 3.9% lower than in 2008. Additional details on the findings of the report are available on Strategy Analytics' website.