Smartphone Shipments Down 6% As Chip Shortage Hits Hard

According to market place research firm Canalys, smartphone shipments in the third quarter this yr are down half-dozen pct when compared to the same menstruation last year. The ongoing global semiconductor bit shortage is to arraign for this slowdown. The report says that smartphone vendors are trying hard to maximize the production of devices. Only the "chipset famine has truly arrived," and the effects of it are now starting to show upwardly in quarterly shipment figures.

Canalys does not wait this chip shortage problem to ease until "well into 2022". So the shipment figures could expect worse in subsequent quarters. Meanwhile, to ensure that OEMs don't over-society components, chip manufacturers are increasing prices. This volition help close the gap between demand and supply.

However, higher costs of central components will likewise hateful college retail prices of devices. Canalys expects smartphone prices to get upward in the coming months. Then the upcoming sales holidays may meet less aggressive discounts than earlier.

The new report as well breaks down the OEM-wise marketplace share for the pinnacle five smartphone vendors in Q3 2021. Samsung tops the chart with a 23 percent market share, unchanged from last year. Apple tree managed to overtake Xiaomi to the second spot with a xv percent market share. It had captured 12 percent of the overall smartphone market in Q3 2020. Xiaomi, meanwhile, didn't see whatsoever twelvemonth-on-year (YoY) changes to its market share (14 pct) during the past quarter. Chinese brands Vivo and OPPO (which now besides includes Ane Plus) make upward the top five.

Smartphone shipments are declining globally due to chip shortage

The smartphone industry showed signs of recovery in the early on parts of this yr following a major slowdown in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. But only when things started to look promising, an unprecedented chip shortage upshot has hit the industry hard. We are now seemingly staring at some other slow year in terms of smartphone shipment.

Research house Counterpoint Research recently lowered its smartphone shipment forecasts for 2021 citing the ongoing chip shortage event. At the start of the year, the company was expecting a nine pct annual growth in shipment to reach 1.45 billion units. Only it has now adapted the forecasts and expects shipments to grow well-nigh six percent YoY to 1.41 billion units.

The study suggested that vendors are receiving less than eighty percent of the requested volume of key components. The issue is getting worse over time. With no immediate solution in sight, the global smartphone shipment may continue to shrink for the foreseeable time to come.