US cellphone sales down 13% in spring

A report today from The NPD Group reveals that 2008's spring quarter saw cellular phone sales in the US drop to 28 million units, or 13 percent less than the same time period in 2007. Revenue from the sales for the same time period, at below $2.4 billion, represented a two percent decrease, the NPD report concluded. Accounting for the discrepancy between these numbers is the fact consumers are spending 14 percent more in the spring quarter of 2008, $84 on average, on phones that have more features, with sales of QWERTY keyboard-equipped handsets jumping by a record of 28 percent, while handsets with Bluetooth jumped 12 percent.

Motorola lost the most of handset sales, though is still the market leader, with 21 percent of the share in the second quarter. Its 11 percent loss in the spring was others' gain, as LG, RIM Blackberry and Samsung gained the market share. Both Samsung and LG are a close second, at roughly 20 percent of the market, with Nokia holding nine percent and RIM's BlackBerry lineup at seven.

On the provider end, 63 percent of all phones during the second quarter of the year were sold via carrier network stores, well ahead of the 8 percent sold by mass merchandisers and 6 percent in electronics specialist stores. Of the carriers, AT&T sits at the top with 29 percent of sales, Verizon Wireless is second at 26 percent, and both T-Mobile and Sprint sharing an 11 point slice.

The NPD did not publish data for the iPhone, which encountered a premature shortage ahead of the iPhone 3G introduction and netted just 700,000 sales before supplies ran out. Device creator Apple is likely to return to the top five after its high-profile summer reappearance.

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