4Q 2014: Apple and Samsung share #1 position in Smartphones Global market share with 19.6% both.

Exhibit 1: Global Smartphone Vendor Shipments and Marketshare in Q4 2014*

According to the latest research from Strategy Analytics, global smartphone shipments grew 31 percent annually to reach a record 380 million units in the fourth quarter of 2014. Apple tied with Samsung to become the world’s largest smartphone vendor.

Global smartphone shipments grew 31 percent annually from 290.2 million units in Q4 2013 to a record 380.1 million in Q4 2014. An impressive 1.3 billion smartphones were shipped worldwide in 2014, with very strong growth seen last year in emerging markets such as China, India and Africa.

Apple shipped 74.5 million smartphones worldwide and captured a record 20 percent marketshare in Q4 2014, increasing from 18 percent a year earlier. Apple’s new iPhone 6 and 6 Plus models are proving wildly popular in China, United States and Europe. Apple tied with Samsung to become the world’s largest smartphone vendor for the first time since Q4 2011. Samsung shipped 74.5 million smartphones worldwide and captured 20 percent marketshare in Q4 2013, dipping from 30 percent in Q4 2013. 

Samsung continues to face intense competition from Apple at the higher-end of the smartphone market, from Huawei in the middle-tiers, and from Xiaomi and others at the entry-level. Samsung may soon have to consider taking over rivals, such as Blackberry, in order to revitalize growth this year. Samsung remained the number one smartphone player globally on a full-year basis in 2014. 

Lenovo merged officially with Motorola to capture 6 percent global smartphone marketshare and take third position in Q4 2014. Lenovo is hoping to leverage Motorola’s famous brand to drive global scale this year and to offset some of Lenovo’s recently weakening smartphone growth at home in China. Meanwhile, Huawei shipped a robust 24.1 million smartphones for 6 percent share and fourth position worldwide in Q4 2014. Huawei is expanding rapidly online in China and through retailers across Africa, enabling it to become an emerging powerhouse in developing markets.

The full report, Apple Becomes World’s Largest Smartphone Vendor in Q4 2014, is published by the Strategy Analytics Wireless Smartphone Strategies (WSS) service, details of which can be found here.

*Numbers are rounded.