The big picture: The global smartphone market is stabilizing, and the rankings have remained more or less the same. Interestingly enough, Huawei is still shipping more phones than Apple, although it's safe to assume the effect of the recent blacklisting will show its teeth in the third quarter.
Strategy Analytics and Counterpoint Research both released their smartphone market share estimates today. A quick glance shows Samsung and Huawei leading the pack with Apple maintaining its third place at 11% despite increasing competition from Chinese brands.
On closer inspection, Apple is the only brand in the top five that has lost market share over the second quarter of 2019. The company's next iPhone lineup is right around the corner, but suppliers are expecting a similar demand to last year, so we'll have to wait and see if the dip was a result of people holding out for a more significant upgrade, or a new market trend. Apple does maintain better profit margins compared to its competitors thanks to a less price sensitive user base and related services that it monetizes however.
Samsung still holds the crown for global smartphone shipments, with one in five handsets sold globally being a Galaxy device. On the other hand, the company is struggling to sell the Galaxy S10, and falling DRAM and NAND prices are cutting profits in half.
Huawei's business seems very much alive and growing, with a healthy year over year increase of almost 5 percent for the quarter ending in June, despite being put on the U.S. entity list. It currently sits at 15.8 percent, not far behind Samsung. Analysts note that the whole smartphone market is down 3 percent compared to last year, and major Chinese brands combined account for a record 42 percent of global shipments.
Realme is now one of the global top ten smartphone makers, which is even more impressive when you consider it only took them a year to get there. In contrast, LG and Sony are mere shadows that just can't seem to turn their mobile efforts
This has been a familiar story for the seventh quarter in a row, and the main takeaway is that the smartphone market has very few avenues for further growth. 5G and foldable smartphones may drive up the average selling price, but likely won't prevent a further drop in the coming quarters.
https://www.techspot.com/news/81251-apple-trails-samsung-huawei-global-smartphone-market.html
