Nokia India has said it will continue to increase its footprint in the smartphone segment in India in the year 2010, contrary to recent reports in the international media that the company would reduce its smartphone portfolio. Vineet Taneja, director marketing, Nokia India, said, ?Going forward, we will continue to drive our smartphones into new markets with a very focused and streamlined portfolio. Nokia is today the clear numero uno in the smartphone market, with close to 35% market share globally in the third quarter of 2009.?
India shipped 4.8 lakh units of smartphones during Q3 CY2009. The top three smartphone vendors during Q3 of calender 2009 were Nokia, HTC and RIM. ?Together, these vendors had a share of nearly 90% of the India smartphones market in terms of unit shipments during the period July-September 2009,? said Naveen Mishra, manager, telecommunications research practice, IDC India. However, their individual market share in the smartphone category and the same as a percentage of their revenue could not be estimated. According to IDC, the India mobile handset market recorded shipments of 100.74 million units in the 12-month period ended September 30, 2009, thereby recording a year-on-year growth of 1.5% (over the 12-month period ended September 30, 2008). Nokia was reported to be looking at halving its smartphone portfolio next year to reduce ?unnecessary differentiation? and maximise the effort behind a few key models. According to Gartner, Nokia?s market share in the worldwide smartphone segment reached an all-time low in the third quarter of 2009, at 39%, compared to 45% in the second quarter of 2009. At the same time, the market share for RIM, HTC, Apple and Samsung increased.
Smartphones contributed 1.9% to the overall global handset market in the September 2009 quarter, as against 2.8% in the previous quarter.
Nokia has renewed its entire range of converged devices including Nokia N97 mini (N900, N97, N97 mini, N86). It is also expanding smartphone capabilities and features into mid-range, such as the Nokia 5230. ?We believe 2010 will see us further increasing our footprint in smartphones. Symbian, our choice for smartphones, continues to be the world?s market leading smartphone platform, accounting for 50.3% of all smartphones globally. We also have measures in place to push smartphones down to new price points globally,? added Taneja.
Nokia?s overall market share in Q3 of this year declined 1.5% points year-on-year due in part to component shortages that may continue into the fourth quarter. It also faced pressure at the high end from competitors? new smartphones, even after it rolled out N97 to more countries in the third quarter of 2009. ?Our volumes and net sales were constrained by component shortages we encountered across the portfolio. While we still compete with the traditional mobile device makers, we are dealing with new competitors entering the market,? Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, CEO of Nokia, had said earlier.
