Smartphone Sales Grew 72 Percent in 2010; Worldwide Mobile Device Sales Reached 1.6 Billion Units in 2010

Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users Reached 1.6 Billion Units in 2010; Smartphone Sales Grew 72 Percent in 2010

February 9, 2011

Gartner - Worldwide mobile device sales to end users totaled 1.6 billion units in 2010, a 31.8 percent increase from 2009 (see Table 1), according to Gartner, Inc. Smartphone sales to end users were up 72.1 percent from 2009 and accounted for 19 percent of total mobile communications device sales in 2010.

"Strong smartphone sales in the fourth quarter of 2010 pushed Apple and Research In Motion (RIM) up in our 2010 worldwide ranking of mobile device manufacturers to the No. 5 and No. 4 positions, respectively, displacing Sony Ericsson and Motorola," said Carolina Milanesi, research vice president at Gartner. "Nokia and LG saw their market share erode in 2010 as they came under increasing pressure to refine their smartphone strategies."

Overall, the mobile device market showed less seasonality than in previous years in mature markets such as Western Europe and North America. Worldwide mobile phone sales to end users reached 32.7 percent growth in the fourth quarter of 2010 as mobile phone sales to end users totaled 452 million units.

Shortages continued to affect popular components, such as camera modules, touchscreen controllers, and active-matrix organic light-emitting diode (AMOLED) screens, in the fourth quarter of 2010.

"This situation will not ease until at least the second half of 2011. Shortages will be a long-term consideration for mobile device vendors, because other fast-growing categories of connected consumer devices, such as media tablets, are competing for the same components," said Ms. Milanesi.

White-box sales exceeded 115 million units in the fourth quarter of 2010 and 360 million units in 2010 overall. Although white box sales helped boost mobile device sales to 1.6 billion units in 2010, it would be misleading to interpret this as market "growth" in the strictest sense.

"What we see is an increase in addressable market for mobile device manufacturers as consumers shift their behavior to buying new phones from legitimate channels over second-hand and black market devices," said Ms. Milanesi.

Table 1
Worldwide Mobile Device Sales to End Users in 2010 (Thousands of Units)

Company	2010 Units	2010Market Share (%)	2009 Units	2009 Market Share (%)
Nokia	461,318.2	28.9	440,881.6	36.4
Samsung	281,065.8	17.6	235,772.0	19.5
LG Electronics	114,154.6	7.1	121,972.1	10.1
Research In Motion	47,451.6	3.0	34,346.6	2.8
Apple	46,598.3	2.9	24,889.7	2.1
Sony Ericsson	41,819.2	2.6	54,956.6	4.5
Motorola	38,553.7	2.4	58,475.2	4.8
ZTE	28,768.7	1.8	16,026.1	1.3
HTC	24,688.4	1.5	10,811.9	0.9
Huawei	23,814.7	1.5	13,490.6	1.1
Others	488,569.3	30.6	199,617.2	16.5
Total	1,596,802.4	100.0	1,211,239.6	100.0

Source: Gartner (February 2011)

The smartphone market remains concentrated in advanced markets, where buyers have more disposable income and where networks are fast enough to support smartphones' full feature sets.

“Western Europe and North America accounted for 52.3 percent of global smartphone sales in the fourth quarter of 2010, with smartphones accounting for close to half of all handsets sold in these regions,” said Roberta Cozza, principal research analyst at Gartner.

Intense competition affected shares at the top of the smartphone market in the fourth quarter of 2010, continuing trends that we have seen throughout 2010.

Additional information is in the Gartner report "Competitive Landscape: Mobile Devices, Worldwide, 4Q10 and 2010." The report is available on Gartner's website at http://www.gartner.com/resId=1542114.

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