Samsung’s Galaxy S4 smartphone became the fastest selling Android phone in history a couple of weeks ago. Samsung announced its flagship phone had surpassed 10 million units sold in under a month. While it can’t move at that speed forever, RBC Capital Markets analyst Mark Sue predicts sales will hit 80 million units this year.
He had this to say, in a note sent to clients today:
“Galaxy S-4 demand in the first month of availability has been incrementally better than our estimate of 10M units. In comparison, the S-III took nearly 2 months (50 days) to achieve the 10M units mark. Our broad-based channel checks at U.S. stores indicate that demand for the 16G S-4 devices remains strong with 32G Black devices mostly sold-out and 32G White devices yet to make it to the stores.
“At this pace, the GS-4 is likely to cross 20M shipments in 2Q13, potentially reaching 80M S-4 unit shipments in CY13. We expect the new version of Samsung’s Note (III) to hit retail shelves in September. We expect Apple to have an updated multi-device smartphone portfolio [sic] with the iPhone 5S, iPhone 5 and iPhone mini this year.”
In his note, Sue also agreed with other firms’ belief that most smartphone growth in 2013 will be driven by mid- and low-end devices. He also predicts a growth in global smartphone shipments of 26% to 870 million units in 2013, and a further 20% in 2014. That would be just over 1 billion units.
[Via: BGR]