The tension between Samsung and Apple continue to escalate as Apple prepares to counter Samsung’s lead over it. Samsung, having once projected sluggish progress in the market, has picked up speed and shot past Apple as the world’s largest smartphone maker. Due to its broad range of products and its reasonably lower prices, Samsung can now expect a 35% growth this year in smartphone sales, according to market researcher Strategy Analytics.
Neil Mawston, executive director of Strategy Analytics, has pointed out that Samsung’s product diversity is its primary strength and has observed that its global smartphone shipments, while lower than last year’s 41% growth, will still jump 27% to 875 million this year. Apple will continue its steady pace upwards; projecting smartphone sales to go up 33% to an expected 180 million units sold this year. Samsung is expected to have a slightly higher increase of 35%, from a projected 215 million units for 2012 to 290 million units in 2013. As a result, Samsung is expected to hold 33% of this year’s market, from last year’s expected 31%, while Apple is expected to hold 21%, which is a jump from last year’s expected 20%.
The duopoly of the global mobile device market currently consists of Apple, the world’s most valuable technology company, and Samsung, the most valuable in Asia. According to Mawston, Samsung’s edge comes from its strategy of segmentation, which allows it to sell greater volumes than Apple, and can be expected to release two smartphones this year, one being the Galaxy S4 the other being the Galaxy Note 3 phablet.
Brian White, a researcher from Topeka Capital Markets, has raised the possibility of Apple releasing a smaller, cheaper iPhone Mini to draw consumers’ attention away from other lower-end smartphones. Mawston, however, disagrees and doesn’t expect it to hit the market this year, so long as the popularity and profitability of the iPhone 5 persists, but does acknowledge that the cheaper alternative would have to be launched over the next three years to address the issues faced by the hundreds of millions of prepaid users who are incapable of affording the current iPhone.
While Samsung may have taken the lead from Apple, both companies are still the strongest growing companies in the market, with continually growing net worth and the highest smartphone shipments than any other competing company.
