TrendForce Research Firm Downgrades Its Forecast on 2015 Smartphone Unit Growth

Global smartphone shipments in Q2 reached 304 million units, a 1.9 percent increase sequentially from Q1, said TrendForce, a Taiwanese research firm, Monday in a report. The firm thinks shipment growth slowed in Q2 “as vendors prepared to launch their flagship devices in this year’s second half,” it said. The firm downgraded its outlook for calendar 2015 and now expects unit growth to climb 8.2 percent from 2014, instead of the 11.6 percent growth foreseen in its previous forecast. The firm blamed the downgrade on “the negative global economic outlook for the second half of this year.” The 8.2 percent increase, if the forecast holds true, would pale in comparison with the 26.5 percent unit growth in 2014 compared with 2013, the firm said.