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Report suggests Apple slipping in handset rankings

by Kelly Hodgkins Oct 28th 2011 at 12:00PM

Last quarter was a transition quarter for Apple and its iPhone. Sales of the 18-month-old iPhone 4 fell slightly as the company prepared to introduce the iPhone 4S. This slowdown caused Apple to slip to fifth place in the global handset market and to the number two slot in the global smartphone market, according to Strategy Analytics.

Strategy Analytics's report examines global handset shipments and reveals that Apple now trails Nokia, Samsung, LG and ZTE. Chinese manufacturer ZTE shipped 18.5 million handsets last quarter and beat out Apple which shipped 17.1 million. Nokia held onto its first place position by shipping 106.6 million handsets, most of which are feature phones.

In the smartphone market, Samsung climbed past Apple with 27.8 million in quarterly smartphone shipments. In the June 2011 quarter, Apple had slid past Samsung to claim first position, but it's time at the top was short-lived due to several market factors.

Neil Mawston, Director at Strategy Analytics says, "We believe Apple's growth during the third quarter was affected by consumers and operators awaiting the launch of the new iPhone 4S in the fourth quarter, volatile economic conditions in several key countries, and tougher competition from Samsung's popular Galaxy S2 model."

Apple may be down this last quarter, but next quarter should be significantly better. During its quarterly earnings conference call, Apple CEO Tim Cook assured analysts that the holiday quarter should see iPhone sales return to record-breaking levels. Early sales of the iPhone 4S have been brisk and these numbers are expected to climb now that Apple is rolling out the handset to additional countries.

[Via AppleInsider]



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Last quarter was a transition quarter for Apple and its iPhone. Sales of the 18-month-old iPhone 4 fell slightly as the company...
 

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12 Comments

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Tetas

There are three degrees of comparison, it is said, in lying. There are lies, there are outrageous lies, and there are statistics.

Shipped is not sold, but really, who buys a phone because the company was number one in SHIPPING.

October 28 2011 at 10:30 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
NameIsDavid

See this: http://www.loopinsight.com/2011/10/28/the-bullshit-samsung-smartphone-numbers/

October 28 2011 at 6:51 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
NameIsDavid

As the manufacturer of basically one current phone model at a time, Apple never intended to rank highest in total sales compared with anyone. It's amazing they rank as highly as they do considering how many smartphone models a company like Samsung makes (including many that are free on contract). Unit sales are pretty irrelevent in any case. If you rank by total profit from smartphone sales, on the other hand, I think you'd find Apple at the top and with a considerable distance between it and the next on the list.

October 28 2011 at 4:49 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
Mr Lizard

And here's Jim Dalrymple tossing that 'Strategy Analytics' (who?)
report straight into the trash where it belongs:

http://t.co/tosyqSx8

October 28 2011 at 4:14 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
Pondo

Who the hell buys samsung phones? garbage, not to mention they copied everything from the iPhone design to the OS "look"

October 28 2011 at 1:02 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
shaunisadirty

Hahahaha, Apple was beat out by a company called ZTE. Fail.

October 28 2011 at 12:56 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to shaunisadirty's comment
Tetas

1.1 billion Chinese disagree.

October 28 2011 at 10:31 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
Gal Cohen

I'm no fanboy of Apple but that makes complete sense since so many people were holding back to see what the iPhone 5 (lets face it, thats what most of us were expecting) was going to be. The real question is how will the Samsung/Apple sales be since the 4S came out...

October 28 2011 at 12:51 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
shippster

Look at how many phones Samsung has on the market with each carrier. This is the game that Samsung cares about winning - market leader by total numbers. It's simply not Apple's strategy; so, it is cool when they are the leader, its not that big a deal to lose that one sometimes. Apple wants to win the brand loyalty and the profit games, and they are doing just fine there.

October 28 2011 at 12:44 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Buzz Mega

How is this equal to "slipping?" Are all circumstances equal?

"Slipping" implies that other, better-recieved competitive items are nudging it out of some ranking, and that's just not the case. It does, however, make for more provocative headlines.

I'd rather characterize this more as an "adjustment" due to blatantly obvious factors, no matter which company, device model or set of external or internal factors were at work.

Are Honda car sales "slipping" because of the tsunami?

October 28 2011 at 12:30 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Mr. Brown

There's a HUGE difference between "shipped" devices and "sold" devices. Why don't financial wizards understanding this simple concept?

October 28 2011 at 12:09 PM Report abuse +1 rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Mr. Brown's comment
Tetas

Because they play the stock market and know they influence it. All they have to do is short a million shares by a dollar and they can make a small fortune in one afternoon with one stupid blog. I would have shorted Apple if I knew about that report in advance then reinvest long that afternoon. It's a gambling game and they try to manipulate it.

October 28 2011 at 10:34 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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