But not for Motorola
The Western European mobile phone market, consisting of traditional mobile phones and converged devices, grew by 9% year on year in 3Q06. Sony Ericsson moved up to a very strong fourth, putting real pressure on Motorola, while Samsung reinfoced its number 2 position.
IDC’s European Mobile Devices Tracker, said that 44.1 million devices were shipped in the quarter, compared to 40.5 million in the year before.
Jean Philippe Bouchard, senior research analyst, European Mobile Devices, said in a note that imaging-orientated handsets and media capable high end feature phones meant that there renewal cycles were healthy, with “strong prepay traction” at the low end.
Key product delays and “portfolio repositioning” meant that sales of converged devices grew slower than anticipated, although converged devices should account for 8% of the total market by year end, IDC said.
But despite the growth, there may be some good deals available to operators, as IDC’s Geoff Blaber predicts that vendors will “increasingly resort to highly aggressive pricing strategies to appeal to operators by reducing the requirement for subsidisation, therefore impacting overall profit margins.”
The biggest winners in terms of market share included Sony Ericsson, which increased its slice of the market from 11.3% to 13.4 for the quarter, despite not having an entry level device. IDC noted that it is likely to build on this success with the launch of converged devices such as the P990 and W950 in the final quarter.
Samsung, which increased sales 20% and market share 1.7% to lie second in the market with 15.2%, was another with a good quarter to look back on. IDC said much of this was based on good sales of the Ultra range.
Motorola saw a very slight decline in shipments, dropping its market share 1.2%, putting it only very narrowly in third place with 13.5% ahead of Ericsson’s 13.4%. IDC attributed this to it keeping its pwder dry for the KRZR K1 and the HSDPA v3xx, to be relased in this final quarter.
Nokia remains a healthy lead, growing sales 9% and keeping its share pretty much static at 35.1%. Although the company faces competition from Sony Ericsson and Samsung at teh high end, expansion of its ow-end portfolio and the launch of further midrange devices under the Express Music brand should bolster its performance outside its high-end portfolio in the final quarter, IDC said.