19 11 02

Strategy Analytics reports that despite stable profits for the major brand players, they will be plagued by slower than expected shipment and revenue growth. LG Electronics and Samsung broke the trend however, growing shipments by 40 percent and 60 percent, respectively.

Chris Ambrosio, Director, Global Wireless Practice at Strategy Analytics, notes, "It is a positive sign for the industry to see vendors remaining profitable in challenging market conditions. Motorola even managed to turn its highest operating margin since 1997. The last several quarters have been highlighted by vendor profit maintenance amid lower than expected volumes. This quarter reaffirms our belief that we are at the bottom of a trough waiting for the eventual upturn in demand."

David Kerr, Vice President, Strategy Analytics Global Wireless Practice, adds, "ASPs remained stable in the third quarter, as feature-rich handsets begin to make their entrance into CDMA and GSM markets. Samsung has paired strong CDMA performance with steady GSM growth to increase annual shipments by 62 percent. LG Electronics grew GSM shipments 60 percent sequentially, and is on track to displace SEMC in the top 5 for the fourth quarter."

Other findings included in this report are that Siemens maintains handset profitability on shipments of 7.8 million units, up 13 percent from Q3 2001; Motorola surging CDMA and TDMA shipments were offset by a poor GSM performance felt hardest in Western Europe.

This report, "Global Handset Market: 3Q 2002 Market Update," is published by the Wireless Device Strategies (WDS) service of Strategy Analytics. The report provides: Q3 Global Handset Shipments (sell-in); Q3 performance metrics for the top five global handset vendors; and Q3 Global Handset Shipments (sell-in) for the top 14 handset vendors.