New iPhone Models Drive 26 Percent Growth for Apple in Q3, While Samsung's Share Shrinks

Samsung’s share of the worldwide smartphone market fell to 24 percent in Q3, from 32 percent in the year-ago quarter, according to Gartner Group. Samsung’s deepest decline was in feature phones, shipment of which decreased by 10.8 percent year over year. Demand for Samsung’s smartphones weakened mostly in Western Europe and Asia, Gartner said, with smartphone sales tumbling 29 percent in China, its biggest market. Emerging markets continued to drive smartphone sales in Q3, with Eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa showing growth of 50 percent year over year, Gartner said. The U.S. led mature markets with 20 percent growth in the quarter, fueled by Apple’s debut of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, said the report. Smartphone sales in Western Europe dropped 5 percent, the third consecutive quarterly decline of the year, it said. Following 26 percent year-over-year growth for Apple worldwide in Q3, Gartner expects record sales of the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus in the holiday quarter, “but we should not underestimate the Chinese vendors and local brands,” said Annette Zimmermann, Gartner research director. Chinese smartphone companies will continue efforts to penetrate overseas emerging markets, while prepaid markets in Europe and low-cost LTE phones will also offer “key opportunities” for Chinese brands, she said. Huawei moved into the No. 3 position worldwide among smartphone vendors, although fewer than 1 million units separate the number three, four and five players, all Chinese brands, Gartner said. Xiaomi cracked the top five for the first time on a 336 percent sales increase, driven by a “strong performance in China” where it became the leading brand, Gartner said. Lenovo filled out the top five for the quarter with market share of 5 percent. Gartner expects 2014 sales of smartphones to reach 1.2 billion units worldwide.