14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung has just outplaced Apple in smartphone sales on a global basis, but it seems that the company still has some catch up to do in some markets around the world including the United States, where HTC is said to be the king at the moment.
The Taiwanese mobile phone maker secured the first position on the US smartphone market in the third quarter of the ongoing year, the latest data from Canalys shows.
Apparently, the handset vendor managed to sell a number of over 5.7 million smartphones marketed under the HTC brand, along with a number of over 70,000 phones that are being sold under the T-Mobile brand.
Overall, HTC managed to ship about one quarter of the total number of smartphones that were sold in the United States during the third quarter of the year.
“However you count it, HTC has become a deserved leader in the US smart phone market,” said Palo Alto-based Canalys Vice President and Principal Analyst, Chris Jones.
“This is an awesome achievement for HTC, which has built a premium brand in a highly competitive market in just a few short years.
“It now has a strong range of 4G Android products, with devices ranged by each of the major carriers, and offers some of the most compelling and differentiated products found on the platform today.”
South Korean mobile phone maker Samsung came in second with about 1 million less smartphones sold in the time frame.
With shipments of its own-brand devices going up to 4.9 million units, Samsung pushed Apple to the third place on the US smartphone market.
The Cupertino-based company sold 4.6 million iPhones in the United States in the three months period, buts its performance was affected by the lack of a new smartphone model (iPhone 4S was launched in early October).
“Next week marks the two-year anniversary of Verizon Wireless’ DROID launch, the tremendously successful family of Android-based smart phones in the United States,” said Jones. “Customers who bought early will see their loyalty tested in the coming weeks as their contracts come to an end.”