2009 to see a billion mobile sales

20 Jul 2005 09:34

Massive global growth and increased uptake of services in Asia will drive the market for handsets to unprecedented heights

Sales of mobile phones are on pace to reach a billion annually by the end of the decade, when nearly 40 percent of the world's population will own a mobile handset, according to a Gartner report.

Asian countries will continue to play a major role in increasing the number of mobile phones in circulation to 2.6 billion by 2009, the research firm estimated in the report, released Tuesday. Currently, 25 percent of all mobile phones are sold in Asian countries; by the end of the decade that number will be one in three, Gartner analysts said.

Overall, the findings bolster the mobile phone's status as the world's most popular electronic device. Mobile handsets have already eclipsed cameras, personal computers and even traditional landline phones in sales.

Gartner's predictions come with an important caveat: Wholesale prices for handsets have to decrease from an average of about $174 (£99) each in 2004 to about $161 by 2009.

While Asia is taking the lead, the sales pace is a global phenomenon, whether it's in Latin America or China — where mobile phones are a relatively new phenomenon — or in European countries saturated by phones and where replacement sales will flourish, Gartner said.

"The sales volume can't be attributed to one region in particular," wrote Carolina Milanesi, Gartner's principal handset analyst. "It's a truly global phenomenon."

Gartner also noted that sales of smartphones will represent about a fifth of all mobile handset sales by 2008. That's good news for the likes of Symbian, Microsoft and other mobile phone operating system makers, which are banking on the smartphone market taking off.

Story URL: http://news.zdnet.co.uk/hardware/0,1000000091,39209835,00.htm