Preliminary Top 10 Smartphone Makers in Q3 - Samsung on top, Nokia tumbles to 10th

I regularly post the full quarterly analysis of the smartphone market on this blog, when all relevant data is in. Now I have all but one data point (still waiting for Gartner to release their count of the total market size for Q3, the other 3 of the big 4 analyst houses, IDC, Canalys and Strategy Analytics have already published theirs). But as we now know the rankings of the Top 10 manufactuers, and I already Tweeted those on Twitter, many have asked for a web link. So I'll post this preliminary Top 10 ranking page only, without yet the market shares (we can't count the market share percent until we know the full market size). But for those who really want to know urgently...

TOP 10 SMARTPHONE MANUFACTUERS Q3 OF 2012 (GLOBAL SALES)

Rank (previous) . . Manufacturer . . . Sales in Q3
1 (1) . . . . . . . . . . Samsung  . . . . . 56.2 Million
2 (2) . . . . . . . . . . Apple . . . . . . . . 26.9 Million
3 (8) . . . . . . . . . . Huawei . . . . . . . 16.0 Million
4 (7) . . . . . . . . . . Sony  . . . . . . . . . 8.8 Million
5 (5) . . . . . . . . . . ZTE  . . . . . . . . . . 8.0 Million
6 (4) . . . . . . . . . . HTC  . . . . . . . . . . 7.8 Million
7 (6) . . . . . . . . . . RIM  . . . . . . . . . . 7.4 Million
8 (9) . . . . . . . . . . LG  . . . . . . . . . . . 7.2 Million
9 (11) . . . . . . . . . Lenovo  . . . . . . . . 7.0 Milllion
10 (3) . . . . . . . . . Nokia  . . . . . . . . . 6.3 Million
Source: TomiAhonen Analysis from vendor and market data
This data may be freely shared

So, first, note - Motorola (Google) tumbles out of Top 10. Welcome to the Top 10 for the first time to Chinese Lenovo! Nokia which was still 3rd biggest smartphone maker in Q2 falls to 10th and risks falling out of Top 10 for Christmas (there's a hot Chinese maker, Yulong, who sell smartphones under the brand Coolpad, who is eager to burst into the Top 10). And Huawei is making a big push up to separate from the pack to take clear 3rd ranking. Sony finally has its act together, is making profits once again with its handset unit and holds fourth place. Obviously Apple is without any challengers at second place, and Samsung sells more smartphones than the next 3 biggest smartphone makers combined.

And its becoming ever more an Asian field. The non-Asian contenders are down to three, one left in the USA (Apple), one from Canada (RIM, in trouble) and one left from Europe (Nokia, about to die - we have again rumors now from Information Week and PC Magazine are again speculating Microsoft will want to buy Nokia). But there are 3 from China, 2 from South Korea, one each from Japan and Taiwan. Soon it will be Asia vs Apple left in this race haha...

More to come soon on this Q3 in what I call Smartphone Bloodbath Year Three, Electric Jamboree. I'll have the full market shares for the above, plus the operating system market shares and the installed base calculated all for Q3 when the full data is available hopefully early next week. Also as usual, I'll be giving a commentary on each of the big smartphone makers and assign 'school grades' for their performance. If you don't know what all is in stock, check out Q2 smartphone market data here.

Comments

[Wayne Borean]

The Bibe according to TechEye: Ye Book of Elop

http://news.techeye.net/business/ye-booke-of-elop

Enjoy.

Wayne

[anti]

@Mats: not exactly the case but there's here.com now

[newbie reader]

Forecasts for top 5 smartphone manufactures, Q4 and next year.

1. Samsung
2. Apple
3. Huawei
4. Lenovo
5. LG

Why Lenovo for no.4? They´ve made it to the 4-9 pack on chinese sales only. To leapfrog the rest of the pack they just need to repeat the same in some 3rd world countries like India, Russia etc. Something they´re already doing.

Why LG for no.5?
It´s less probable and less obvious, see my prev. post here:
http://communities-dominate.blogs.com/brands/2012/11/preliminary-top-10-smartphone-makers-in-q3-samsung-on-top-nokia-tumbles-to-10th.html#comment-6a00e0097e337c8833017c334decbf970b

there i did market trends scetch, more of this below.

The following are three recent market trends behind the companies:

1. Innovation trend and raise of new OSes. (Apple, HTC)
Apple iOS and HTC (Hero etc.) on Android side.
Trend is almost over now, smartphone is essentially invented.

2. Parts manufacturer trend. (Samsung, LG)
It all started with Apple bulling Samsung and other part suppliers, to squeeze the profits. Would Apple keep Samsung happy by sharing some of its megaprofits, it all could go some other way.

But now, when Samsung tried to sell its parts by selling its own phones and succeeded tremendously, there is no way back. Other part manufacturers follow this way.

This is strongest trend currently, and the reason to bet on LG for separating itself from the pack and make it into top 5. This trend also could elevate the likes of Sharp.

3. Commonity trend. (ZTE, Lenovo)

This is the most recent trend behind the rise of ZTE and most recently, Lenovo.

Huawei belongs somewhere in between trend 2 and trend 3.
They are chinese smarphone commodity seller like ZTE and Lenovo,
but they also aspire to follow Samsung business model when possible.

ZTE would do number 5 if this newest trend overrule samsung trend. But not further, even now ZTE growth on this trend is cut by stronger players, Lenovo and Huawei

Sony are "old school business", like Moto, who nevertheless tries to do something on all the trends (see their recent plans on buying chinese phones for resale)
One can put Sony and Moto on "trend 0" line for the sake of classification.

RIM is in safe tiny haven of alternative OS. They would not sink, but would not go up either. The only thing that could damage them is some takeover operation, like with Nokia. But here their tiny-ness protect them, predators just do not care about their lot.

Sadly, it is HTC that looks like next most probable victum of Tomi Ahonen´s cliff theory. They do not have any other business, and their trend is over. They´ve got only their brand, not backed by anything else. However, they can team up with some of their numerous taiwanese buddies like asus acer mediatek etc.

Nokia have to do something besides WP8 or die.

[bubblegum necklace beads]

Jums noteikti ir dažas patīkams viedokli un uzskatus. Jūsu emuārs sniedz svaigu apskatīt subject.Have esat domājuši par ieviešot dažas sociālās Grāmatzīmes pogas, lai šos blogus. Vismaz google.I patiešām novērtējam rakstus par jūsu mājas lapā. Jūs darāt naudas sodu darbu! Thanks daudz.

[hemrid]

Business and marketing challenges for the 21st century is a book about how the new phenomenon of digitally connected communities.

[Jack]

Very nice phone.
From
http://www.nordichardware.se/Smartphone-Recensioner/

[vladkr]

BTW... a rather old news, but that I missed... Nokia cuts jobs even in China :
http://www.globaltimes.cn/content/738264.shtml

How bad situation can be if they fire Chinese workers ?

[V-pills Faydaları]

Yes, The Big Triad (E///, Moto and Nokia) is fading away... :-(
E/// out of handset game, Moto is out of Top10, Nokia is #10!

[smart phone]

When someone writes an article he/she keeps the image of a user in his/her brain that how a user can know it. So that's why this post is perfect. Thanks!

[Weightloss]

All things being even, most would opt for the better fuel right. I count them as 4 even though he explained them as 5 because one of the rules is you have to stuff your face with junk once a week on your cheat day. If you make a solid commitment, you will have the necessary desire to overcome that adversity and keep pushing on.

[Oneplus 4]

MS seems to have given up on smartphones. They now will deliver a version of Office for Android and iOS.

That was their last card in the game. And rather than lose Office to a Google/Apple competitor they throw WP8 for the bus.

[johan]

XiaoMi is number 4 i think