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As they always say, there is always a first time for everything. For the global smartphone market, the fourth quarter of last year saw the industry suffer its first ever year over year decrease in terms of the total volume of sales, at least according to new information presented by Gartner.
Per the research firm’s numbers, the industry finished the year 2017 with a total sales volume of close to 408 million units. While that figure still represents an impressive quantity, it also happens to signify a 5.6 percent decrease, as compared to the total unit sales number registered during the fourth quarter of the previous year (2016).
Even the biggest smartphone brands in the planet are not immune to the overall decline -- industry leader Samsung saw its fourth quarter unit sales decrease by 3.6 percent during the final three months of 2017. Meanwhile, Apple also posted a 5 percent decline during Q4 2017, despite the fact that the iPhone maker usually records its best sales numbers in the busy holiday shopping season year after year.
As pointed out by Gartner, a couple of factors might have contributed significantly in the fourth quarter year over year decline. The first one has something to do with the slowing of upgrades among end users who own feature phones (basic cell phones) to smartphone devices. A possible reason is that there just aren’t that many quality budget friendly smartphones made available in the market for them to adequately choose from. The second factor is that those consumers who do already own smartphones are becoming increasingly prone to choosing quality models that do not need replacing right away, leading to longer replacement cycles, and presumably, resulting to fewer smartphone purchases even during the holidays.
Apple’s case is made more interesting because of the unusual release schedules of its 2017 flagship devices. The fact that the iPhone X was launched on a later date compared to the iPhone 8 and the iPhone 8 Plus, and had to undergo some production and availability issues might have affected overall iPhone sales. Still, Gartner is projecting that Apple’s numbers for Q1 2018 should bounce back at some extent, considering that production for the iPhone X has normalized a bit.
As for Samsung, the South Korean tech giant is expected to unveil its latest flagship device, the Galaxy S9, a few days from now, and its launch should also boost the company’s smartphone sales for the first three months of this year.
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