Samsung, the Korean smartphone maker, is beating Apple in global smartphone sales, even as Chinese makers like Huawei, Xiaomi and Oppo are closing in. When it comes to the market share, Samsung leads Apple by almost 10%.
This shift in the sales figures is because Samsung has shifted their emphasis to budget phones while Apple has stuck to targeting only the premium customers.
This year, the month of June alone saw 3.6 billion active smartphones users globally out of which 893 million active devices were Samsung. Apple has slumped to the second position followed by Oppo, Xiomi, Huawei, and Vivo respectively. These four Chinese makers make up a third of the World’s active market, as they mine on the bottom of the pyramid which holds trillions in disposable income. The costs of these phones are negotiated to fit the mass market. Apple neglects the lower end consumers, considering the high operational charges and less profit from these segments.
The story of Apple takes a different turn as Apple is switching from LCD to OLED displays for its new phones, but the company as such is blind to the latest technology and hence Apple has to depend on Samsung, the only company that can manufacture these displays at large scale. Though being the most significant competitor of Apple, the Korean giant has been supplying it keeping their love-hate relationship intact.
When analyzing the premium phone segment (phones priced above $400), Samsung seems to have bitten a large piece of Apple’s market share. Apple’s market share dropped from 73 % in 2012 to 38 % in May 2018 due to the intervention of other manufacturers. Samsung Galaxy S3/4 and Galaxy Note 2 have been deemed to be better products compared to Apple's latest.
Apple lacked in keeping pace with other product vendors while Samsung was successful in managing it.
Android Vs. IOS
Though a lot is impressive about IOS, it is not suitable for everyone. Prompt and consistent software seems to be a problem for the Android platform, but it is on the right track for being more versatile and customizable. Android phones come with different styles and patterns, bigger screens and fantastic battery life. Apple leaves its customers with a decidedly less choice.
These factors have added to the Samsung's better sales.
