Inflection point in Global mobile sales – Q2 2013

The latest Gartner Mobile sales reports are clearly saying one thing – the 2nd quarter of 2013 has been the inflection point in Global Mobile sales.

1. Feature phone sales were lower than Smart phone sales for the first time ever. This is big, as it is a sure sign of how mobile usage trends would look like. Mobile operators across the developing world must be cheering this report as it is a strong promise to them that the data-usage and hence non-voice revenues might increase. The gadget is no longer the bottleneck.
2. Micorsoft Windows overtook Blackberry for the first time to be 3rd biggest Operating Source.
3. Android is now almost 80% of new shipments (up from 64% last year) where as Symbian is down to o.3% from almost 6% last year. Symbian was what Nokia’s feature phones ran on.
4. Lenovo is now the 4th largest Smartphone supplier and the 7th largest across all categories of mobiles. Interestingly, almost 95% of these sales are domestic sales within China. If Lenovo can crack the international markets, they would be a serious player to reckon.
5. As expected Samsung took the biggest pie – 25% of overall mobile market and 32% of the smarphone market.
6. While Apple saw an increase in its number of units shipped, it saw a serious drop in its average sales price. Mainly due to the heavy sales of its now-cheaper iPhone4 especially in markets like India. Many are saying that this is yet another reason why Apple might want to consider a low-price-iPhone.