Feature Phone Shipments Surpassed by Smartphones for the First Time

Gartner has noted that in Q2, 225 million units of smartphone shipments were recorded, surpassing the shipment number of feature phones for the first time.

There was a 46.5 percent year-over-year increase in smartphone sales, with a 21 percent year-over-year drop for feature phones, according to Gartner.

Slalom Consulting is a Boston, Massachusetts-based solution provider. The national director of research and development at that firm, David Uhler, commented that the new information from Gartner supports the increasing significance of mobility practices.

Uhler said: "Mobile used to be treated like a second- or third-class citizen but now, especially over the last year, it is more of a first-class or even primary citizen."

Gartner's research vice president, Carolina Milanesi, stated that emerging markets and the lessening price gap between smartphones and feature phones are behind the increase in smartphone adoption.

Milanesi said: "Feature phones will be relegated to the very bottom end of the market as many smartphones today can reach prices as low as $70."

Uhler said that faster smartphone adoption is usually present in areas which lack infrastructure, "but there is still a massive undercurrent [of smartphone adoption] in stable and existing markets, the U.S. being a great example."

Computer EZ is a solution provider based in Mendon, Vermont. The president of that company, Larry Gold, said that findings from the Gartner report were expected, and companies like AT&T, Verizon and Sprint will be more impacted by it than solution providers. Email reconfiguration may be the only value-added area which was affected by smartphone growth this year, Gold added.

In the global smartphone market, Samsung is at the top with a 31.7 percent share, and has a 2 percent increase from the same quarter last year. There was a 10.2 percent year-over-year increase in Apple sales; the company has 14.2 percent of the global share.

There was not much demand for Nokia feature phones, and from last year, mobile feature phone sales fell by around 6 percent. Lumia, Nokia's smartphone line, grew 112.7 percent in Q2 as the company expanded the portfolio. Year-over-year smartphone growth of 60.6 percent was also seen by Lenovo; the company reached 11 million units in Q2.

By the end of the year mobile phone sales worldwide are expected to reach 1.82 billion units, according to Gartner. (CY) Link