'No-names' drove Q2 handset market

Lesser-known feature and smartphone brands made the biggest gains in the second quarter, according to IDC.

Both Samsung and Apple fell back and Huawei slipped out of the top five as the lower prices of Android phones accounted for 42.4% of smarphone sales, compared with 36.4% in the previous quarter and 40.2% a year ago.

Just under 237 million smartphones were shipped, up 53% from a year ago. Samsung, Apple and LG remained the top three vendors, with Lenovo taking Huawei’s spot at fourth and ZTE retaining fifth position.

In the broader mobile phone market, 432m units were sold, with the top three – Samsung, Nokia and Apple – also losing market share to smaller brands such as Alcatel.

Said Ramon Llamas, a research manager with IDC's mobile phone team:

“Lower-priced smartphones continue to gain traction, but the key for vendors will be to keep prices low while still offering premium devices and services. We fully expect to see large-screen smartphones and other flagship devices establish a presence within the lower-priced smartphone segment as well."

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Huawei terminal sales up 54%

Huawei might be known for its networking gear, but its terminal group is also on a roll.

The division, which makes everything from smartphones to video-conferencing units, boosted sales 54% last year to $4.5bn.

Chinese media reports (here and here) say an un-named senior executive told staff at a company Chinese New Year function that unit shipments increased 30% in 2010 to 121mn.

Of these 30mn were smartphones, making the company the fifth biggest Android handset-maker behind Samsung, HTC, Motorola and Sony Ericsson.

The privately-held firm reported full-year earnings of 21bn yuan ($3.2b) on revenue of 149bn in 2009.