IDC: Smartphone Sales to Increase 45% for 2012

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A new report from IDC predicts that smartphone shipments will top 717 million for 2012, a 45 percent year-over-year increase. The Android operating system maintains a clear lead over all competitors, accounting for 68.3 percent of smartphones sold.

Computerworld’s Matt Hamblen reported, “The positive news for smartphones is countered by IDC’s projection of just a small increase — 1.4% over last year — in sales of all types of mobile phones. The worldwide mobile phone growth rate is the smallest recorded by IDC in three years. Shipments are projected to reach 1.7 billion globally in 2012, IDC said.”

Nathan Eddy from eWeek quoted IDC’s Kevin Restivo, who said, “Sluggish economic conditions worldwide have cast a pall over the mobile phone market this year. However, the fourth quarter will be relatively bright due in part to sales of high-profile smartphones, such as the iPhone 5 and Samsung’s Galaxy S3, in addition to lower-cost Android-powered smartphones shipped to China and other high-growth emerging markets.”

Byte’s Larry Seltzer noted, “An analysis of the mobile phone market by analyst firm International Data Corporation’s (IDC) shows Android the ‘clear leader’ in the smartphone mobile operating system race with 68.3% of the market in 2012. The iPhone is a distant second at 18.8% with all other operating systems below 5%.”

And ZDNet’s Matthew Miller summarized IDC’s predictions for 2013, writing, “As you can see in the chart below from IDC, they forecast that Android will remain dominant with nearly 65% of the market, iOS will remain stagnant at about 19%, Windows Phone will grow from 2.6 to 11.5%, and BlackBerry will remain fairly constant at around 4%. It’s difficult to predict what will happen with RIM starting in 2013 with the release of BB OS 10 and if Windows Phone 8 really will attract buyers to propel it into double digits in four years. I do agree with the Android and iOS predictions though as these have held fairly steady and likely will continue this way.”