Samsung's Smartphone Sales Surpass Apple's

Samsung in the July-to-September period surpassed Apple Inc. as the leading seller of smartphones by shipping around 28 million, about four times the number it achieved a year earlier, in a rapid transformation of its biggest business by sales.

Apple said earlier this month it shipped around 17 million smartphones in the same period. Samsung in the period also closed in on Nokia Corp. as the world's largest seller of all cellphones. Samsung's telecom division, which accounted for 36% of revenue, provided more than half of the firm's operating profit and experienced its best profit margin since 2004. Smartphones provided about 31% of the division's revenue and more than 80% of its operating profit, analysts estimate. According to market research firm Strategy Analytics, global smartphone shipments in the third quarter grew 44% from a year earlier to reach a record 117 million units. It said Samsung's share of the smartphone market rose to 23.8% during the quarter from 9.3%, while Apple's market share fell to 14.6% from 17.4%. Nokia Corp. saw its share fall sharply to 14.4% from 32.7%.