First Quarter Handset Market Grows Despite Samsung and Apple Heading in Different Directions

An estimated 405 million handsets, including 197 million smartphones, were shipped in the first quarter of 2013, according to market intelligence firm ABI Research. Smartphone shipments grew 38% year-over-year (YoY) while feature phone shipments declined 5.2% YoY. Shipments of all handsets grew 12% YoY in the first quarter thanks to the continued strength of the smartphone market, which achieved an all-time high of 49% shipment penetration.

“Worldwide handset and smartphone shipments exhibited classic Q1 softness,” says senior analyst Michael Morgan. “Samsung accomplished strong smartphone growth while Apple dismissed a troubling mix of slowed growth and declining margins as a sign that the older iPhone 4S was in high demand.”

Nokia handset shipments plummeted to 62 million in Q1 with smartphone shipments at a 5-year low of 6.1 million. Considering market and OEM specific conditions, BlackBerry delivered a respectable 6 million shipments, with 1 million coming from the launch of BlackBerry 10-based devices. Despite HTC’s well-designed ONE devices, shipments continued to decline 37% YoY to 4.8 million. LG continued its revival with 10.3 million smartphone shipments and 16.2 million handset shipments.

“The last time a major smartphone OEM showed a trend of decreasing margins combined with falling ASPs and slowing growth, BlackBerry was still on the favorable side of a large market share and revenue drop,” adds senior practice director Jeff Orr. “With major product announcements teased for Q3, Apple risks falling behind the innovation curve unless the next iPhone is more revolutionary than evolutionary.”

These findings are part of ABI Research’s Mobile Handset Markets Database service, which includes files detailing smartphone and mobile handset shipments, forecasts, and market share.