South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co remained at the top of the rapidly growing smartphone market early this year as Chinese rivals gained ground, a survey showed on Wednesday.
The overall global smartphone market grew 28.6 percent from a year ago with 218.8 million units sold in the first quarter of the year, the survey by International Data Corp said. That was down 2.8 percent from the fourth quarter of last year, with a seasonal impact on sales.
Samsung had a 30.2 percent market share, compared with 31.9 percent a year earlier.
Apple Inc of the US remained the No. 2 global vendor at 15.5 percent, which was down from 17.1 percent.
Chinese firm Huawei Technologies Co (華為) held third place with a 4.7 percent share, with year-over-year sales growth of 47 percent.
Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) saw 63 percent sales growth and a 4.6 percent share, ahead of South Korea’s LG Electronics Co’s 4.4 percent.
IDC expects 19 percent sales growth in smartphones this year, following the first billion-plus sales year last year.
IDC analyst Ramon Llamas said he sees “sustained strong demand, driven by emerging markets, low-cost devices and the proliferation of 4G networks.”
This suggests “another record-breaking quarter at the end of the year,” he added.
Singapore-based IDC research manager Melissa Chau said the smartphone market is being driven increasingly by China.
“The face of the smartphone market is changing rapidly to reflect the rise of its largest market, China, where a record 40 percent of the smartphones shipped worldwide in the first quarter were bound to Chinese consumers,” Chau said.
“In a quarter where global shipments declined sequentially, China bucked the trend. The market benefited from its seasonal Lunar New Year uptick, greater emphasis on 4G devices... and the official launch of Apple at China Mobile (中國移動) resulted in volumes a third higher than fourth quarter levels.”
The latest survey did not break down sales by operating system, but suggests that the Google Inc’s Android system remains dominant, after grabbing about 80 percent of sales in late last year.
Apple and Samsung are locked in a legal battle in the US and elsewhere, with the US giant accusing its rival of infringing on patents.
Apple has accused Samsung of copying key features of the iPhone in creating its own lines of smartphones. Samsung has counter-sued, claiming two of its patents were infringed.
Apple is seeking US$2.2 billion and Samsung asked jurors for a little more than US$6 million.
The California jury began deliberating on Tuesday after a month-long trial, but failed to decide the patent-infringement case on Wednesday.
The panel was to resume deliberations yesterday at the US federal courthouse in San Jose, California.
At one point on Wednesday, they sent a note to the judge asking several questions about evidence.
US District Judge Lucy Koh told jurors no additional evidence is available to them beyond what was presented at the trial.
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