Samsung, Apple Still Lead Global Smartphone Shipments in 2014

Samsung and Apple still managed to dominate and retain their spots in worldwide smartphone shipment last year, according to a report by technology market intelligence company TrendForce. Which companies round up the top ten? Find out after the break.

Samsung still takes the top spot in 2014 with 326.4 million units shipped or 28%, a 3.5-percent decrease from last year’s 32.5%. As of this year, the Korean electronics giant’s share still continue to decline, and forecasts deduce the share to 26.6%. Analysts from the TrendForce report attributed the decline to increasing competition: Its flagship S and Note series faced the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, and its mid- and lower-end devices battled against the more bang-for-the-buck smartphones from Chinese OEMs.

Apple is still secured in its second place position, but also faced a slight 0.2-percent decline from last year’s 16.4% to 16.2%, attributing the success to the new large-sized iPhone 6 Plus. Together with Samsung, they make 518 million shipments, or over half of the 1.167 billion units of smartphones shipped worldwide last year.

The merger of Lenovo and Motorola in Q4 2014 proved to be beneficial, as it is now the top Chinese smartphone vendor. With the merger finalized, its shipments worldwide grew over a hundred percent, exceeding 90 million units or 7.9 percent of the market share.

LG went up to the fourth place with 6.0%, an almost two-percent increase from last year. The report attributes the company’s up-climb to its “high quality products at low prices” strategy, which includes the G2 and the G3 flagship models.

Rounding up the top five is Huawei, which went down a spot a spot after being overtaken by LG. Xiaomi went down to 6th, but is still noted as the brand with the best cost-performance products. Overall, Chinese device manufacturers are represented in six of the top ten spots, and as a whole shipped 40 percent of the market’s smartphones, or 453.4 million units.

Here’s a comparison chart of the top ten smartphone vendors based on market share:

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