In the Q2 2008, tier one handset vendors enjoyed year-over-year unit shipment growth of between 15 and 22 percent. According to ABI Research estimates, 301 million units were shipped during the period reaffirming the research company’s forecast that the mobile device market will deliver 13% growth to take 2008 annual shipments to 1.3 billion units.
In terms of market share, Nokia has passed the 40% threshold, while Samsung secured second place with 15.2%. Motorola certainly saw better times and the American handset maker barely managed to keep ahead of LG with its 9.3% versus LG’s 9.2%. Sony Ericsson fell down to the 5th position, gaining 8.3% of the market. Additionally, there is a distinct possibility that LG might overtake Motorola by the end of Q3 2008, while Nokia’s share is likely to hold, as it refreshed its portfolio in the mid-tier and high end categories and has pretty much cornered the ultra-low cost handset market.
ABI Research’s Jake Saunders commented: “If there is an economic slowdown, no one bothered to tell the mobile device buying public. In particular, consumers in emerging markets in Asia, the Middle East, Africa and South America shrugged off inflation fears to sign up as mobile phone users. These healthy gains in net subscriber additions are stimulating replacement and upgrade sales. In developed markets handset purchases tended to be flat, but those consumers who did purchase dug deeper and paid out more for coveted higher-end handsets and smart-phones.”
ABI Research’s “Mobile Devices Market Sizing and Share” provides quarterly and annual historical vendor market share and ASP trends, and spreadsheets quantifying the latest quarterly wireless handset announcements and handset features analysis. More information is available from here.