Apple's iPhone, iPad combine for 14% share in Samsung's home of South Korea

Posted:
in iPhone edited January 2014
Samsung has a decided home-field advantage in South Korea, but a new study looking at market share in that country shows that Apple's iOS accounts for roughly one out of every seven mobile devices even in its rival's backyard.



The newest figures out from mobile industry analyst firm Flurry's most recent look at the mobile device market in South Korea, one of the world's most tech savvy nations. Flurry found more than 33 million active smartphones and tablets in the country, and Apple's iOS platform was running on 14 percent of those.

Manufacturers based out of South Korea enjoyed the most success in that country, With chief Apple rival Samsung far and away the most preferred device maker in the country. Samsung held a 60 percent share of the South Korean mobile device market, according to Flurry, followed by LG, also based out of South Korea, with a 15 percent share. Pantech, another South Korean firm, came in behind Apple with just 10 percent of the South Korean market. All other Android manufacturers amounted to just one percent of the market.

The study also found that so-called phablets -- larger-screened smartphones sized somewhere between a normal smartphone and a small tablet -- are remarkably popular in South Korea. Whereas phablets make up only seven percent of mobile devices worldwide, they account for 41 percent of Android and iOS devices in South Korea. Phablets in that country are so popular that they appear to be depressing sales of tablets. Whereas Flurry sees tablets accounting for 13 percent of devices worldwide, they account for only five percent in South Korea.



Beyond South Korea, Flurry's new analysis seems to indicate that tablets are not a fad. The segment has grown from just two percent of the market six months ago to seven percent in the present. A number of analysts have recently speculated that Apple would soon enter the phablet segment, with the latest reports putting a larger iPhone device on the schedule for some time in 2014.

Samsung may have the home advantage in South Korea, but its products reportedly aren't as well loved by their owners as Apple's are. Apple has already topped Samsung in terms of customer satisfaction for the iPhone. Yet another survey on tablet satisfaction saw the iPad beating out Samsung and LG tablets for the third year in a row.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 40
    drblankdrblank Posts: 3,385member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    Duh. Not everyone can afford the best


    I think instead of buying a tablet and a smartphone, they buy a phablet.

  • Reply 2 of 40

    Maybe these tech savvy country also has mentality like those cheap-nerdy-tech-tards that bigger is better.. plus more hertz, cores, ram, open, get wow'ed on gimmick/unnecessary features, etc

  • Reply 3 of 40

    Does Samsung account for 1 out of 7 smartphones in the US?

  • Reply 4 of 40
    droidftwdroidftw Posts: 1,009member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by StruckPaper View Post

     

    Does Samsung account for 1 out of 7 smartphones in the US?


     

    They're doing much better then 1 out of 7 in the US.  Roughly 1 out of 4 smartphones in the US are Samsung phones.

     

    If one were to count the number of phones in the US with internal parts made by Samsung that number significantly increases.

  • Reply 5 of 40
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by StruckPaper View Post

     

    Does Samsung account for 1 out of 7 smartphones in the US?


    Samsung accounts for 24% of the U.S. smartphone market due to selling smartphones at so many different price-points.  Samsung is certainly doing better here than Apple is doing in S.K. definitely because of lack of a phablet offering.  I don't know the iPhone carrier situation in S.K. but I'm willing to bet Apple could sell a lot more iPhone 5s is they were available and Apple pushed sales a little harder.  In S.K. they really seem to like large smartphones.  Of course, I think it's admirable for the S.K. consumer to back their domestic brands because it shows loyalty to their country and local economy.

  • Reply 6 of 40
    noahjnoahj Posts: 4,503member
    Does Samsung account for 1 out of 7 smartphones in the US?
    Don't know, but that is a good point. The numbers are able to be used to say whatever you would like them to say. Unless you can show that this is a reversal of a longstanding trend where they have always dominated sales and no other phone manufacturer was ever able to gain any meaningful foothold before.

    In the US this is not the case, whatever was the best at the time held the lions share for the most part. No home field advantage has truly ever existed in this market that I am aware of. Is this the same for South Korea? I honestly do not know.
  • Reply 7 of 40
    sflocalsflocal Posts: 6,092member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    they also love fermented cabbage with dead fish heads.  Which i love also.

     

    different culture so i can't blame them.  plus Samsung is a source of national pride and who knows how many of those phones are $99 phones.




    I think "national pride" is pushing it.  The contributions they make to the SK economy is huge, but at the same time knowing that company is considered corrupt by their own people and convicted executives are running the show, it's more a source of embarrassment than anything.

  • Reply 8 of 40
    droidftwdroidftw Posts: 1,009member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    To be fair you would only count phones in the $500-$700 range.  Many of those Samsung phones are $99 phones.


     

    Most high end phone sales in the US are subsidized.  If that weren't the case then the high end smartphone market would be much smaller then it is.  This would give a huge advantage to phones like the Nexus brand phones and the bottom of the barrel Android phones.  To be fair, I think it makes sense to count them all as that reflects the real world as opposed to arbitrary constraints that don't reflect the reality of the situation.  Also, the poster that posed the initial question didn't ask the question you're trying to answer.

  • Reply 9 of 40
    droidftwdroidftw Posts: 1,009member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    so a $700 phone is equal to a $50 phone? Ridiculous.

     

    bottom line is you are not comparing Apples with Apples.  A ton of those Samsung phones are glorified feature phones.


     

    The poster that posed the initial question didn't ask the question you're trying to answer.

  • Reply 10 of 40
    sog35 wrote: »
    To be fair you would only count phones in the $500-$700 range.  Many of those Samsung phones are $99 phones.

    Excellent point. Every time Samsung's numbers come out... it's "ZOMG they sell so many phones!"

    What is sometimes overlooked is those phones aren't all flagship Galaxy S4 and Galaxy Note.

    So yeah... Samsung gets the title of largest smartphone vendor... but it's made possible in large part by their $100-200 offerings.

    Of course Samsung will sell more units at those prices than a company like Apple whose prices start at $450... but whose $600+ phones make up the bulk of their sales.

    You're right... Samsung sold 76 million smartphones last quarter. But how many were $500 and above? I'd be curious to know too.
  • Reply 11 of 40
    maltamalta Posts: 78member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    so a $700 phone is equal to a $50 phone? Ridiculous.

     


     

    Exactly! Who in their right mind would EVER buy a phone that cost you less than $50. It would have to be complete and total garbage. Phones like these should never be considered smart phones. Cut these crap phones from all reporting metrics...

     

  • Reply 12 of 40

    Do we have any data for similar Asian markets (China / Japan)? It would be interesting to see whether those are similar.

  • Reply 13 of 40
    cnocbuicnocbui Posts: 3,613member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    so a $700 phone is equal to a $50 phone? Ridiculous.

     

    bottom line is you are not comparing Apples with Apples.  A ton of those Samsung phones are glorified feature phones.




    A ton of them aren't.  There have been occasions where Samsung phones like the Galaxy S3 have outsold the iPhone in the US, so they are clearly selling plenty of their top end models.

  • Reply 14 of 40
    Why do I get the impression that most of the articles on AI like this are just fresh meat for the forums?
  • Reply 15 of 40
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by malta View Post

     

     

    Exactly! Who in their right mind would EVER buy a phone that cost you less than $50. It would have to be complete and total garbage. Phones like these should never be considered smart phones. Cut these crap phones from all reporting metrics...

     


     

    You should go in and ask for your free iPhone, maybe get a couple since they're free.

  • Reply 16 of 40
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by DroidFTW View Post

     

    Most high end phone sales in the US are subsidized.  If that weren't the case then the high end smartphone market would be much smaller then it is.  This would give a huge advantage to phones like the Nexus brand phones and the bottom of the barrel Android phones.  To be fair, I think it makes sense to count them all as that reflects the real world as opposed to arbitrary constraints that don't reflect the reality of the situation.  Also, the poster that posed the initial question didn't ask the question you're trying to answer.


    I don't think you seem to understand what the word 'subsidy' means.

  • Reply 17 of 40
    sumergosumergo Posts: 215member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton View Post



    Why do I get the impression that most of the articles on AI like this are just fresh meat for the forums?



    Good point.  Personally, I'm getting the feeling that many of the articles are just seeds for "hope-for-dissension" - lots of mindless yakking, with no substance.  Who gets to decide what articles are published here anyway?  Can anyone become "Kasper's Automated Slave"? ;-)

  • Reply 18 of 40
    philboogiephilboogie Posts: 7,675member
    The comparison will be different if North Korea was added and the US would include all of the US. And please, let's not fire up that discussion again.
  • Reply 19 of 40
    vl-tonevl-tone Posts: 337member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by malta View Post

     

     

    Exactly! Who in their right mind would EVER buy a phone that cost you less than $50. It would have to be complete and total garbage. Phones like these should never be considered smart phones. Cut these crap phones from all reporting metrics...

     


    Getting an iPhone 4S at $0 will likely lock you into an expensive voice+data contract. The cheapest Android "smartphones" are given away with voice plans and special cheap limited data plans. The 4S is not among the cheapest cellphones even at $0.

     

    And nothing changes the fact that a significant percentage of Android phones that are sold are so cheap and crippled that people use them as feature phones and seldom use or buy apps. Those devices contribute almost nothing to the app ecosystem which is why they shouldn't count in marketshare statistics. Who cares if Android has the majority of the market share if a good part of its users don't do anything to sustain the app ecosystem.

     

    The 4S runs iOS 7 quite nicely and so people can tap into the vast iOS App store and get all the latest apps. Compare that to cheap $0 Android phones with crippled data plans and that run old versions of Android and have limited app support.

  • Reply 20 of 40
    froodfrood Posts: 771member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

     

    To be fair you would only count phones in the $500-$700 range.  Many of those Samsung phones are $99 phones.


     

    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Michael Scrip View Post





    Excellent point. Every time Samsung's numbers come out... it's "ZOMG they sell so many phones!"



    What is sometimes overlooked is those phones aren't all flagship Galaxy S4 and Galaxy Note.



    So yeah... Samsung gets the title of largest smartphone vendor... but it's made possible in large part by their $100-200 offerings.



    Of course Samsung will sell more units at those prices than a company like Apple whose prices start at $450... but whose $600+ phones make up the bulk of their sales.



    You're right... Samsung sold 76 million smartphones last quarter. But how many were $500 and above? I'd be curious to know too.

     

    Actually- his argument probably only skews the numbers more in Samsungs favor.  There are many vendors below the $500 range...  At the $500 and up range there's pretty much Apple, Samsung, and a very few others (HTC, Sony?)  Most of the non-Apple phones sold would be the Samsung S3, S4, or Notes with the occasional One, or Experia.  Motorolla's phones are usually below $500.

     

    So the number of Samsung phones sold per phone in the "phones over $500" category is probably quite a bit higher than if you do include the lower end ones.

     

    Either way, the original article posted is counting 'mobile devices' ranging from <3.5" screens to all tablets to come up with Apple's 1 in 7 count.   If you're trying to contrast numbers between the US and S. Korea you need to use the same metric.  If your goal is just to try and make numbers seem better for Apple in either situation, then yes, just change which devices you choose to count differently in each country depending on whatever fits your cause. =p

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