Andre Yoskowitz
29 Jul 2011 15:03
Market research firm IDC has noted this week that global mobile phone growth was not as strong as expected.
Sales of smartphones, however, were up 76 percent as the world moves away from feature phone to always-connected devices.
Feature phone sales declined 4 percent, the first decline since 2009, leading to overall growth of just 11.3 percent in the quarter.
Says IDC analyst Ramon Llamas:
While this is not a new trend—smartphones have been the primary engine of growth for the last several quarters—it does mark something of a transition point, as demonstrated by the growing number and variety of smartphones featured in the vendors’ portfolios.