Well, that’s that sorted, then. I pretty much gave up referring to the Big Five (in terms of mobile phone manufacturers) ages ago, ‘cos it’s a list that’s in a constant state of flux, so who I say is the Big Five might not be the Big Five tomorrow. See, back when I first got into this trade, the Big Five was Nokia, Sony Ericsson, Samsung, LG and Motorola. And then it changed. And then it changed again.
But every now and then, I feel like doing a post about who the current top manufacturers are, ad now we have the results of the IDC study for 2011. And the top three?
In ascending order, it’s Apple, then Samsung, but to my surprise, Nokia still has the top spot…
That was a bit of a surprise, but what ended up being more surprising is who’s in the number four and five spot. Well, okay, the number four spot isn’t too surprising, ‘cos it’s LG, who were always one of the Big Five. No, the surprising bit is who’s in at number five, ‘cos it’s not who I expected, i.e. it’s not HTC.
No, apparently, it’s Chinese manufacturer ZTE.
Now, that is a surprise, but then, its been on the cards for ages. Chinese manufacturers like ZTE and Huawei are making a big push on the worldwide stage, so it’s kinda cool to see one entering the Big Five.
The question, now, is this: which phones have made this happen? Well, Apple’s easy, ‘cos the iPhone 4S sold like gangbusters in the tail end of 2011, and as for Samsung, the obvious answer, there, is the Samsung Galaxy S II. Nokia’s a bit more difficult, ‘cos they’ve not had any real superstar phones out in the last 12 months, what with the switch over to Windows Phone, and all that. I suspect, though, that their operations in developing nations have given them a huge boost.
So, yeah. That, apparently, is the new Big Five. How times change, eh?
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