re: The Samsung / Siemens Race
>> Samsung Aims To Strengthen Its Global Handset Market Share
Yang Sung-jin
Korea Herald
December 15, 2001
Samsung Electronics, the country's largest mobile handset maker, is poised to beef up its marketing to elevate its mobile handsets in global rankings next year.
Analysts and competitors are focusing on whether Samsung will be able to outpace its rival Siemens to snatch the fourth position in the global rankings for the year 2001. Samsung's global market share in 2000 was the sixth largest.
Samsung's ambition to sprint forward in the fast-growing sector, in fact, reflects the reality that its profitable handset business is offsetting the losses it has suffered in the chip business.
Samsung's handset sales accounted for about 80 percent of revenue and 90 percent of operating profit in the third quarter. Semiconductors, meanwhile, made up just 14 percent of revenue and brought in about 355 billion won in losses in the July-September period.
Samsung, the world's largest memory chipmaker, suffered losses stemming from weaker demand and abrasive price-gouging in the DRAM chip industry worldwide.
In late November, Samsung said it strengthened its overall world market share for mobile phone sales in the third quarter of the year. During the period, Samsung's sales moved up a notch to secure fourth place in the rankings with a 7.5 percent market share.
Its handset sales ranked fifth during the second quarter, with a 6.9 percent share of the world market.
According to figures released by Dataquest, Samsung sold 7,108,000 units in the July-September period, driving its share up by 3.5 percent from the year-earlier period. The company ranked seventh in global sales in the third quarter of 2000.
Dataquest's research showed that Nokia increased its share of mobile phones shipped during the third quarter from 30.6 percent last year to 33.4 percent this year, although its volume slipped from 32.06 million to 31.5 million.
Motorola maintained the No. 2 ranking by increasing its market share from 13.3 percent to 15.7 percent and its volume from 13.9 million to 14.8 million. Ericsson's market share fell from 9.7 percent to 8 percent while its volume dropped from 10.1 million to 7.5 million.
Siemens slipped from the No. 4 spot in the third quarter last year with 8.6 percent to 7.2 percent this year and its volume slipped from 8.97 million to 6.8 million.
Samsung edged Siemens out of fourth place in the third quarter, and moved a step closer to a place among the big-three makers.
Samsung's rise in the global rankings can be attributed to expanding markets for its CDMA (code division multiple access) handsets in Australia and the United States, as well as its inroads into the European GSM mobile-phone market since 1998.
Analysts said Samsung benefited in the third quarter from higher-than-expected demand from European markets and the introduction of a new model for 2.5G mobile telecom service, which offers video-and audio-on-demand functions.
Samsung is set to export about 22 million handsets to Europe and the U.S. this year, while selling 6 million units in the domestic market.
Analysts said the company's focus on the more profitable high-end segments of the mobile market with multimedia handset models helped to offset losses in its memory chip business.
The company is emphasizing design with its "lighter, smaller, thinner" philosophy, and is anxious to strengthen its position in Europe, where it has traditionally been weak.
LG Electronics, the No. 2 handset manufacturer in Korea, sold 2.89 million units in the third quarter, rising to the eighth largest position on the global market with a 3.1 percent market share.
It sold a total of 7.35 million units in the year to end-September, carving out a 2.6 percent market share, or the world's ninth largest.
Meantime, worldwide mobile phone shipments in the third quarter were down 10 percent from the same period last year to 94.4 million units.
However, investment bank Morgan Stanley Dean Witter & Co. raised its forecast for global mobile phone sales this year and next year. Morgan Stanley analysts increased their 2001 handset sales estimate to 390 million from 370 million. They expect the industry to sell 435 million phones next year, up from a previous forecast of 420 million. <<
- Eric - |
