Smartphone shipments faced a poor plight during the pandemic that began in 2019 but surprisingly, they rebounded a bit in 2020 and started getting better. Meanwhile, hurdles like chipset shortage derailed them, and their after-effects can still be felt. While the semiconductor industry is still pretty short of chip production, leading market researchers are bullish that the situation will return to pre-pandemic production levels in 2022.
A report from TrendForce, a market analyst, suggests that all the OEMs combined will ship roughly 1.39 billion phones in 2022, thereby collectively hitting a 3.8% YoY growth rate. The researcher gauges that the main drivers are going to be the same, with Samsung taking the lead once again by shipping around 276 million units and recording 1.1% YoY for itself.
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Even though Samsung is expected to maintain its lead over all other brands worldwide, market watchers estimate that the company could face fierce competition in emerging markets due to the rise in demand for entry-level models, a segment where Samsung is going puny. Samsung has so far maintained its market share in the high-end segment using its Foldable series and the researcher believes this will continue next year as well.
The South Korean giant that records its maximum profits from its semiconductor segment is rumored to turn to Qualcomm for its next flagship Galaxy S-series for some regions where it used to sell Exynos-powered counterparts. This is due to the in-house production issues that might be too alarming for the company to handle alone.
The market analyst expects Apple’s smartphone production for 2022 to reach 243 million units, representing a 5.4% YoY growth and the second-highest volume among all smartphone brands. The report points out the release of new handsets in 2022, including the much-rumored iPhone SE and four regular iterations will likely help Apple increase its market share next year.
Furthermore, the report says Xiaomi could register itself to the third spot with an estimated shipment of 220 million units in 2022. The report points out that its research includes the brand’s subsidiaries as well, including Mi, Redmi, Poco, and Black Shark. Collectively, the leading Chinese brand can record 15.8% YoY growth for itself.
Fourth on the list is Oppo that could add its 208 million units to the total number of products in 2022 and record a 2.5% YoY growth. Finally, Vivo is likely to grab the fifth rank next year by producing almost 150 million handsets, thereby seeing a 6.4% YoY growth.
The report also concludes that out of the 1.39 billion smartphones' expected production, roughly 660 million will be capable of 5G connectivity, this is because not every region has fully embraced the technology due to several reasons and challenges. Thus, this would translate to a market share of 47.5% for 5G handsets in the overall smartphone market.
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