Apple fell to 18% share of smartphone sales in Q1, Gartner says

Posted:
in iPhone edited January 2014
While Apple increased its iPhone sales year over year, its share of the global smartphone market shrank to 18.2 percent in the first quarter, according to data from Gartner.

Gartner


Apple fell from its 22.5 percent share a year ago, the new figures released on Tuesday show. Meanwhile, Apple's chief rival Samsung increased its market share from 27.6 percent a year ago to 30.8 percent in the first quarter of 2013.

In fact, Apple was the only company among the top five smartphone vendors to see its share shrink. Third-place LG Electronics grew from 3.4 percent in 2012 to 4.8 percent in 2013, while Huawei Technologies grew to 4.4 percent, and ZTE took a 3.8 percent share.

Success seen by Android handset makers helped Google's mobile platform take a commanding 74.4 percent lion's share of the smartphone market. The iPhone is the only smartphone on which Apple's iOS is available, and so its second-place platform share of 18.2 percent was identical to its hardware market share.

"Apple is faced with the challenge of being increasingly dependent on the replacement market as its addressable market is capped," said Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner. "The next two quarters will also be challenging, as there are no new products are expected to be coming before the third quarter of 2013."

In all, global smartphone sales grew from 147 million a year ago to 210 million in the first quarter of 2013. Smartphones accounted for 49.3 percent of all mobile phone sales worldwide, up from 34.8 percent in the first quarter of 2012.

?Feature phones users across the world are either finding their existing phones good enough or are waiting for smartphones prices to drop further, either way the prospect of longer replacement cycles is certainly not a good news for both vendors and carriers looking to move users forward,? Gupta said.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 98
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    Just curious where Gartner gets their data from and how they know what the smartphone market is so they can assign share percentages? What company besides Apple provides quarterly shipment data?
  • Reply 2 of 98
    maestro64maestro64 Posts: 5,043member
    I am so tired of these analysis, they are all cutting data to tell some story which they have no clue about. So now Apple will only sell to previous apple user since all others are too cheap or too stupid to buy an apple product.
  • Reply 3 of 98
    herbapouherbapou Posts: 2,228member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Rogifan View Post



    Just curious where Gartner gets their data from and how they know what the smartphone market is so they can assign share percentages? What company besides Apple provides quarterly shipment data?


    of course, when we are not happy with the numbers lets question the source...


     


    Fact is Apple is painting itseft into a niche corner just like it did in the 80's. This year is pretty much last chance for Apple to come out with multiple iphone models that adress the entire market. 


     


    Apple was able to slow down its tablet market share freefall with the ipad mini, its needs to move asap on the phone side.

  • Reply 4 of 98

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by herbapou View Post

    Fact is Apple is painting itseft into a niche corner just like it did in the 80's. This is year is pretty much last chance for Apple to come out with multiple iphone models that adress the entire market. 


     


    And the niche market is worth more than all others combined. It isn't market share driving profits. It is specialty. Think Neiman Marcus, Daimler-Benz, Chanel, LHMV and a few others. When executed well, operating in niche markets is very successful. There is not always a reason to be the largest, especially if you prevent any product line dependencies (I am not saying production lines) with other companies. 

  • Reply 5 of 98
    rogifanrogifan Posts: 10,669member
    herbapou wrote: »
    of course, when we are not happy with the numbers lets question the source...

    Fact is Apple is painting itseft into a niche corner just like it did in the 80's. This is year is pretty much last chance for Apple to come out with multiple iphone models that adress the entire market. 

    Apple was Able to slow down its tablet market share freefall with the ipad mini, its needs to move asap on the phone side.
    excuse me? This has nothing to do with whether I'm happy with the numbers. If Gartner said Apple had 75% market share I'd still question where they got their numbers from since no one outside Apple provides sales/shipment figures.

    And how many times before have we heard its doom and gloom for Apple if they don't do X or Y. Before the iPad came out all the pundits an tech blog writers said Apple had to do a netbook, had to do a cheap laptop. They did the iPad instead. I don't think Apple's fortunes lie in a cheap phone for China and a 5" phone for geeks. I seriously hope they're working on bigger things than that.
  • Reply 6 of 98
    lilgto64lilgto64 Posts: 1,147member


    Woo hoo - we cut our margins and increased our give aways and shipped more units that Apple, we win !!!


     


    or - Apple's sales have slumped they are doomed, doomed I tell ya, unless they maintain the highest market share how can they possible demand the highest profit margins? 


     


    or - Low stock of Apple's iPhone indicates the ramp up of the highly anticipated iPhone 6 with translucent case and internals and holographic display, 5G service, thought interface, and 2000 lumens projector built in. And one more thing - beyond anyone's wildest predictions the iPhone 6 will have an all new camera that can take a picture of itself !That's right, no more will you need to take a picture of the all new iPhone using last year's model, which doesn't do the new phone justice. Only the new iPhone 6 with holographic ThreeSixD (that is 360 Degree 3D) image capture will make every previous camera obsolete, just as soon as we get the new data center up and running...

  • Reply 7 of 98
    wakefinancewakefinance Posts: 855member
    maestro64 wrote: »
    I am so tired of these analysis, they are all cutting data to tell some story which they have no clue about. So now Apple will only sell to previous apple user since all others are too cheap or too stupid to buy an apple product.

    It sounds like you know what's really going on in the smartphone industry. What did your research and analysis reveal?
  • Reply 8 of 98
    Long time Apple supporter here from the beginning. I think Apple is alienating its customers. People today have a very low attention span, so when you wait 1 year to always update your phone marginally it leaves your competitors plenty of time to catch up as Samsung, LG and HTC have done. Many pros are ditching Apple as well from Video to Photography. We havent seen a Mac Pro update since 2009, we receive a crappy Final Cut Pro X that doesnt have backward compatibility and has many limiting factors such as Audio. I'm about ready to jump ship. On the touch screen side Apple has pretty much limited its touch screen capability to its iOS instead of OSX. While Microsoft has Windows 8 ( buggy ) but none the less it works.

    It seems like forever since I was excited about something Apple has produced. All we keep hearing are about all these new amazing products that are coming in 2013. I'm waiting.
  • Reply 9 of 98
    In Europe 2-3 years ago if i saw a smartphone, it was like 95 % apple Iphone.
    Now its about 70% Samsung and 30% Apple in Germany.
    In Luxembourg 40% Samsung and 60% iPhones.
    The problem is, that more and more want to switch to bigger Screens :-(

    I love my iPhone, but lets keep realistic!
    They have to bring out some big news in the next months :-)
  • Reply 10 of 98
    MarvinMarvin Posts: 15,309moderator
    lilgto64 wrote: »
    Woo hoo - we cut our margins and increased our give aways and shipped more units that Apple, we win !!!

    That seems to get forgotten in all of these threads. Google and Amazon sell products with little to no profit - no doubt why Amazon has a coin initiative so they have a hope of turning a profit this year instead of a $39m loss like they did last year. Samsung's profitability is improving but their average selling price is still well below Apple's.

    Samsung and Google are also commonly mentioned in the same sentence. Samsung looks to be gearing up to ditch Google and Android in favour of Tizen. As soon as they do, will the Android fans turn on them? It won't matter because in an instant, they'll wipe out about half of Google's sales share. One of the reasons given in favour of Tizen is hilarious:

    http://www.phonesreview.co.uk/2013/04/24/tizen-the-newcomer-in-the-mobile-phone-os-arena/

    "Tizen is designed to be similar to Android in terms of its key features, albeit with a more open source foundation"

    Android isn't open enough! There's a test here, which rates Android at just 23% open:

    http://www.pcworld.com/article/246140/is_android_open_not_so_much_study_finds.html

    Walled garden with a shorter wall. We'll see what happens sometime this year:

    http://www.sammobile.com/2013/05/03/gt-i8800-gt-i8805-first-tizen-devices-by-samsung/
  • Reply 11 of 98
    macrulezmacrulez Posts: 2,455member


    deleted

  • Reply 12 of 98
    mstonemstone Posts: 11,510member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by TheDutch67 View Post


    And the niche market is worth more than all others combined. It isn't market share driving profits. It is specialty. Think Neiman Marcus, Daimler-Benz, Chanel, LHMV and a few others. When executed well, operating in niche markets is very successful. There is not always a reason to be the largest, especially if you prevent any product line dependencies (I am not saying production lines) with other companies. 



    iOS is not like those other luxury products. Chanel does not need to interact with an ecosystem. Apple needs a large user base because it makes no sense to build an entire cloud computing, app and developer platform for a select few users. That is exactly what happened to the Mac in the 80's. There just weren't enough graphic artists in the world to keep the Mac platform growing. iOS must be a mass market consumer electronic platform in order to survive.

  • Reply 13 of 98
    pedromartinspedromartins Posts: 1,333member


    exactly mstone.


     


    Time for more screen sizes, it isn't about price but that could help too with another iphone line.

  • Reply 14 of 98
    jfc1138jfc1138 Posts: 3,090member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by pedromartins View Post


    exactly mstone.


     


    Time for more screen sizes, it isn't about price but that could help too with another iphone line.



    The LTE iPad mini provides plenty of that screen size you want.

  • Reply 15 of 98
    richard getzrichard getz Posts: 1,142member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by herbapou View Post


     


    Fact is Apple is painting itseft into a niche corner just like it did in the 80's. This is year is pretty much last chance for Apple to come out with multiple iphone models that adress the entire market. 


     


    Apple was Able to slow down its tablet market share freefall with the ipad mini, its needs to move asap on the phone side.



     


    I think this is more that others are trying to force Apple out of the niche market. Apple has always been a niche market and from what I can tell, they are quite happy in that space, and know how to make huge amounts of money there. 


     


    So why don't you and other stop trying to force Apple out of the niche market? 

  • Reply 16 of 98
    richard getzrichard getz Posts: 1,142member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Bob Carpenter View Post



    Long time Apple supporter here from the beginning. I think Apple is alienating its customers. People today have a very low attention span, so when you wait 1 year to always update your phone marginally it leaves your competitors plenty of time to catch up as Samsung, LG and HTC have done. Many pros are ditching Apple as well from Video to Photography. We havent seen a Mac Pro update since 2009, we receive a crappy Final Cut Pro X that doesnt have backward compatibility and has many limiting factors such as Audio. I'm about ready to jump ship. On the touch screen side Apple has pretty much limited its touch screen capability to its iOS instead of OSX. While Microsoft has Windows 8 ( buggy ) but none the less it works.



    It seems like forever since I was excited about something Apple has produced. All we keep hearing are about all these new amazing products that are coming in 2013. I'm waiting.


     


    I'm not alienated. In fact, I'm excited to upgrade to the 5s. I wonder if all those people who stand in lines for hours feel alienated? 

  • Reply 17 of 98
    paxmanpaxman Posts: 4,729member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by pedromartins View Post


    exactly mstone.


     


    Time for more screen sizes, it isn't about price but that could help too with another iphone line.



    Yes - I have warmed to your idea of a larger screened iDevice as the primary mobile device of the future, replacing the iPhone. I think calling it an iPhone will be misplaced as I wonder if the primary purpose of the iPhone is / will be, as a phone. I have finally seen people using the larger Samsungs in the wild and though I still find it very large it no longer looks ridiculous. At the moment the iPhone sits well in my back pocket and I wonder if a larger device would easily get damaged (an iPhone replacement needs to be pocketable). Cue the flexible device that can take the shape of an average arse. Bent makes sense.

  • Reply 18 of 98
    anantksundaramanantksundaram Posts: 20,403member


    Another bit of data idiocy.... these Gartner guys don't even seem to be able to tell the difference between "sales" (table heading) and "shipments" (column headings).


     


    Pity the fools who pay for this kind of data fluff.


     


    Btw, 18% of shipments -- assuming the number is believable -- is a pretty darn good number, considering that only 10% of the Android phones -- assuming the number is believable -- are comparable to Apple's iPhone.

  • Reply 19 of 98
    rob53rob53 Posts: 3,241member


    It's a simple chart to understand. Samsung is simply flooding the market with a bunch of cheap "smartphones." This is the same way Microsoft conquered the desktop world. Allow any hardware manufacturer to licensed their software no matter how crappy the hardware was. Samsung has taken it a step further by being the major Android distributor but they still are selling all kinds of knock-off phones that aren't necessarily that smart.

  • Reply 20 of 98
    macrulezmacrulez Posts: 2,455member


    deleted

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