14 DAY TRIAL // Throughout the first quarter of this year, the mobile phone market demonstrated constant growth and according to IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, retailers shipped more than 256.4 million units, recording a 10 percent increase comparing to the same period last year.
Nokia is still the leading brand on the market (no surprise to that) having shipped 91.1 million phones throughout the quarter. The company was also able to maintain its devices' ASPs at 89 Euro.
Due to the success of handsets like the N73, N70 and the recently released E65, Nokia reported a record shipment of 11.8 million units in the converged mobile device space.
Motorola, on the other hand, still hopes that the devices it has announced or released at the beginning of the year will turn things around and pave their way to success towards the end of the year.
After shipping 45.5 million units and experiencing operating losses, Motorola has now shifted its focus towards recovery (and hopefully dropped the idea of endlessly releasing different color versions of the RAZR).
Samsung recorded a great success with its UltraEdition handsets and became more active within emerging markets while Sony Ericsson registered the largest year-on-year growth among the leading vendors during the quarters.
"While rankings did not change among the top five vendors, some interesting trends have begun to unfold," says Ryan Reith, research analyst for IDC's Worldwide Mobile Phone Tracker. "Samsung was able to benefit from Motorola's misfortunes by recording a positive sequential growth in the first quarter, which is uncommon given the effects of seasonality on this industry. While Motorola announced plans to revamp growth, the sudden shift in momentum demonstrates how competitive this industry is and how innovation on product development is essential."