Smartphones shipment numbers exceeded PCs, tablets in 2011

The PC market saw a slowdown, last year and if present reports are anything to go by, then the situation for the PC market is only going to worsen, this year. Canalys, a research firm published a report that revealed that smartphone shipments exceeded PCs in 2011. This is supposedly the first time such a thing as happened. A total of some 158.5 million smartphones were shipped in the last quarter of 2011, as compared to the 101.2 million smartphones in Q4 2010. In 2011, a total of some 487.7 million smartphones were shipped, as compared to 299.7 million in 2010 - that’s a massive 63 percent growth over 2010. On the other hand, desktop PCs only grew 15 percent. It must be noted that the count of PCs also includes tablets that made up for 15 percent of PC shipments.

Mobile phones - in a league of their own

Tablets by themselves, grew some 274 percent, which is a massive boost, but still, the numbers didn’t in anyway come close to the number of PCs or smartphones shipped. Canalys VP and analyst, Chris Jones said that there was a major drop in demand for netbooks and also in the notebook and desktops space, but at the same time, demand for tablets grew substantially. Smartphones have gone from being a niche product to truly a mass consumption device. Dropping prices for all of these products have also boosted numbers and popularity. Customers are also now looking at using the Internet and consuming media and using apps on their devices, much more than they ever have before. At the same time, Canalys expected to see some price hikes in 2012, as companies try to make more profits. He said that traditionally companies, such as Huawei, ZTE and LG who were focused on lower price will now focus more on the higher priced segment. 

Apple's iPhone - doing rather well 

The report goes on to say that Apple was the top vendor in Q4 of 2011. Some 37 million iPhones, 15.4 million iPads and 5.2 million Macs were sold. These kind of numbers make Apple the most successful brand, selling most number of smartphones in any quarter. The last record was held by Nokia, who sold some 28.3 million phones in Q4 2010, much lower than Apple’s 37 million.