Global sales of smartphones to end users totalled 380 million units in the first quarter of 2017, a 9.1 per cent increase over the first quarter of 2016, according to Gartner.
Mobile phone buyers are spending more to get a better phone, resulting in the rise in average selling prices of these types of phone, Gartner said.
The shift in buyer preference is positively affecting Chinese manufacturers such as Huawei, Oppo and Vivo in their strategy to build desirable features at affordable prices. Their combined market share in the first quarter of 2017 accounted for 24 per cent, up 7 percentage points year on year.
1. Samsung
Q1 2017 sales: 78,671,400 (81,186,900 in Q1 2016)
Q1 2017 market share: 20.7 per cent (23.3 per cent in Q1 2016)
Samsung’s smartphone sales declined 3.1 per cent in the first quarter of 2017.
“Although Samsung announced that preorders for the Galaxy S8 and S8 Plus are up 30 per cent year over year, the absence of an alternative to Note 7 and the fierce competition in the basic smartphone segment are leading Samsung to continuously lose market share,” said Anshul Gupta, research director at Gartner.
2. Apple
Q1 2017 sales: 51,992,500 (51,629,500 in Q1 2016)
Q1 2017 market share: 13.7 per cent (14.8 per cent in Q1 2016)
“Sales of iPhones were flat, which led to a drop in market share year over year,” said Mr Gupta.
“Similar to Samsung, Apple is increasingly facing fierce competition from Chinese brands Oppo and Vivo, among others, and its performance in China is under attack.”
3. Huawei
Q1 2017 sales: 34,181,200 (28,861,000 in Q1 2016)
Q1 2017 market share: 9 per cent (8.3 per cent in Q1 2016)
Huawei edged closer to Apple with smartphone sales amounting to 34 million units in the first quarter of 2017.
Despite its P9 and P9 Plus being available for more than a year now, both smartphones continued to sell well, positioning Huawei as a dominant brand in the consumer market.
“Huawei has now steadily held the third spot in the worldwide ranking of smartphone vendors,” said Mr Gupta. “However, pressure is mounting as its counterparts in China are catching up.”
4. Oppo
Q1 2017 sales: 30,922,300 (15,891,500 in Q1 2016)
Q1 2017 market share: 8.1 per cent (4.6 per cent in Q1 2016)
Oppo is continuing to catch up with Huawei. With a 94.6 per cent increase in worldwide smartphone sales in the first quarter of 2017, Oppo achieved the best performance of the quarter and retained the No 1 position in China.
“Oppo continued to rally sales through a large network of brick-and-mortar retailers, beating market incumbents such as Samsung and Huawei,” said Mr Gupta.
Oppo’s strategy — centred on the camera, fast charging and offline retail — has helped it grow smartphone sales in the international market.
5. Vivo
Q1 2017 sales: 25,842,200 (14,001,000 in Q1 2016)
Q1 2017 market share: 6.8 per cent (4 per cent in Q1 2016)
Vivo sold almost 26 million smartphones and achieved a market share of 6.8 per cent, which helped it achieve growth of 84.6 per cent in the first quarter of 2017.
“Vivo saw growing demand of its smartphones from the emerging markets in Asia/Pacific, including India, where sales grew over 220 per cent thanks to its increased brand appeal and high-quality smartphones,” said Mr Gupta.
6. Others
Q1 2017 sales: 158,367,700 (156,654,200 in Q1 2016)
Q1 2017 market share: 41.7 per cent (45 per cent in Q1 2016)
These include the likes of LG, BlackBerry and Sony.
