Nokia 25 pcnt share
By Pulkit Sharma

Worldwide, mobile communication device sales to end users totaled 427.8 million units in the first quarter of 2011, an increase of 19 percent from the first quarter of 2010, according to Gartner, Inc. Smartphones continued to outpace the rest of the market, and a newly competitive mid-tier smartphone market will drive smartphones into mass adoption and accelerate this trend.

“Smartphones accounted for 23.6 percent of overall sales in the first quarter of 2011, an increase of 85 percent year-on-year,” said Roberta Cozza, principal research analyst at Gartner. “This share could have been even higher, but manufacturers announced a number of high-profile devices during the first quarter of 2011 that would not ship until the second quarter of 2011. We believe some consumers delayed their purchases to wait for these models.”

Nokia sold 107.6 million mobile devices in the first quarter of 2011. Its market share declined 5.5 percentage points year-on-year, and its share has reached its lowest since 1997. Nokia will aggressively lower average selling prices (ASPs) in markets where communications service providers (CSPs) control the sales channels, in order to maintain shipments of Symbian devices while waiting for its first Windows Phone 7 devices to reach the market. However, Nokia will face challenges from Android competitors and from some Japan-induced supply constraints.

Samsung experienced its strongest first quarter ever. The shift to higher end smartphones, such as the Galaxy line, led to an increase in ASPs. This helped to offset an increase in materials costs. Samsung made numerous product announcements during the first quarter of 2011. These included numerous Galaxy smartphone announcements (such as the Galaxy S II), a bada device (Wave 578), and new models of the Galaxy Tab tablets (10.1 and 8.9). These new devices, along with the effects of seasonality and expansion into emerging markets with touch and dual-SIM devices, should help improve Samsung's performance in the second quarter of 2011.

Apple sold 16.9 million units to end users worldwide, more than doubling its sales of iPhones year-on-year. This market-beating growth came from all regions: the iPhone is now available in 90 countries from 186 CSPs.

HTC recorded a very strong first quarter with 9.3 million mobile communication devices sold and moved to the No. 7 position. Strong high-end products helped HTC perform well with all major US CSPs, and in the first quarter of 2011 it became the No. 2 smartphone manufacturer in the region, overtaking Research In Motion.

Although in mature markets the shift from feature phones to smartphones is accelerating, smartphones overall moved down-market in the first quarter of 2011. Several manufacturers, including HTC, Sony Ericsson, Alcatel and ZTE, announced a broader portfolio of mid-tier devices, mainly based on Android, which will reach the market in the second quarter of 2011.

Android and Apple's iOS continued to dominate the smartphone operating system (OS) wars. However, the big news in the first quarter of 2011 was Nokia's strategic alliance with Microsoft on Windows Phone 7, and the retirement of Symbian.