Global mobile phone shipments reached a record of 441 million units up 2% during Q1 2015 compared to previous year but some markets such as China, India, USA and Europe slowed down. The list of top mobile phones brands is led by Samsung, Apple whereas the brands like Xiaomi, ZTE and Huawei continue to be strong. LG and Lenovo continue to be in the middle challenging the top positions. Smartphone shipments also touched record of 342 million units for the first quarter of 2015 growing 16%. Smartphones now represent 78% of all mobile phones shipped during this quarter (68% in Q1 2014) as feature phone demand continued to shrink fast globally. Chinese brands continue to rise on their smartphone designs which are getting thinner and metallic, narrowing portfolios and multiple brands for multiple channels allowing them to penetrate further in the market. Top 8 smartphone brands captured almost two-third of the global smartphone market. This ranking is based on Total Shipments in Q1 2015 and Q4 2014 as well as average global market share captured by the mobile brands during these two quarters. This list also captures feature phone shipments with smartphone shipments.
10. Sony Mobile
Sony Mobile is jointly headquartered in Japan and Sweden.
It was founded in 2001 and it has R&D facilities in Tokyo, Chennai, Lund, Beijing and Silicon Valley. Sony merged with Ericsson in April 2001 to form Sony Ericsson, which focused on digital photography and personal information management capabilities. Few flagship devices of Sony are Sony Xperia Z3+, Sony Xperia Z4 etc.
9. ZTE
ZTE was founded in 1985 and ZTE mobile division was founded in 1997 and based at Shanghai.
This division is mainly dedicated to Mobile Communications products and includes products for GSM, PHS, WCDMA and TD-SCDMA technologies. In 2009, ZTE became the third largest vendor of GSM telecom equipment in world and is still going strong.
8. Xiaomi
Xiaomi is a Chinese electronics company headquartered in Beijing, China. It has emerged a strong brand in past few years.
It was co-founded by eight partners in April, 2010 & it designs, develops and sells smartphones, consumer electronics and mobile apps as well. It had released its first phone in August 2011.
7. TCL- Alcatel
TCL-Alcatel was founded in 2004 and is headquartered in Hong Kong.
It is a subsidiary of TCL Communication Technology Holdings Ltd. In Hong Kong or mainland China, TCL Communication is one of the few companies who licenses or owns 4G, 3G, 2.75G, 2.5G and 2G -patented technologies.
6. LG
LG Electronics is a South Korean company headquartered at Seoul. It was founded in 1958 as Goldstar.
LG made the world’s first CDMA digital mobile handset in 1997 and has ever since been one of the most prominent mobile manufacturers. LG entered the smartphone industry in 2010 and is still a strong player in the industry.
5. Huawei
Huawei is a Chinese networking and telecommunication company headquartered in Guangdong. Its products are used in many countries and is a well known brand.
It was founded in 1987 by a former engineer in People’s Liberation Army and it has 21 R&D institutes all over the world. Huawei surpassed Xiaomi in the smartphone market, and has over the past some time become a prominent player in the mobile market.
4. Lenovo
Lenovo is a Chinese computer technology company and was founded in 1984.
It has headquarters in Beijing, China and North Carolina, US. Lenovo has operations in more than 16 countries and it sells its product in around 160 countries, which tells us about its globalpresence. Lenovo has R&D centres at 8 locations and 4 Countries namely China, US, Singapore and Japan.
3. Microsoft Mobile
Microsoft completed acquisition of Nokia Devices & Services division during the 2nd quarter of 2014 and formed Microsoft Mobile as a hardware business unit for devices.
Microsoft mobile is headquartered in Finland and it is wholly owned subsidiary of Microsoft. Principle activity of Microsoft Mobile is to design, develop, manufacture and distribute mobile phones, smartphones, tablet computers and related accessories.
2. Apple
Apple Inc. is headquartered in California, US. It was founded on 1st April 1976 by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ronald Wayne.
Apple is world’s 2nd largest IT Company by revenue after Samsung Electronics and also a global leader in making Apple iPhone brand. Apple became the first company in US to be valued more than $700 billion.
1. Samsung
Samsung shipped total 99 million mobile phones as the sales of non-smartphone feature phones declined as the world is moving towards smartphones now.
Smartphone shipments however rose to 83.3 million units taking back the leading position in smartphone segment from Apple after Apple’s solid holiday season quarter of 2014. However premium smartphone shipments with S5 & Note 4 shipments declined as the premium segment was dominated by Apple, ahead of Samsung Galaxy S6 roll out in Q2 2015.
