Gartner is reporting today that world smartphone sales soared to 149 million units in Q4 2011, a 47.3 percent jump. According to Gartner smartphone volumes during the quarter rose due to record sales of Apple iPhones. As a result, Apple became the third-largest mobile phone vendor in the world, overtaking LG. Apple also became the world's top smartphone vendor, with a market share of 23.8 percent in the fourth quarter of 2011, and the top smartphone vendor for 2011 as a whole, with a 19 percent market share. Samsung was close second in smartphone market with 34 million units.

In the smartphone OS market (see Table 3), competition between Google and Apple intensified. Android's share declined slightly sequentially. This was due to strong iPhone sales, driven in particular by the iPhone 4S in mature markets and the weakness of key Android vendors as they struggled to create unique and differentiated devices. Samsung remained the main contributor to Android share gains in the second half of 2011. iOS's market share grew 8 percentage points year-on-year, but Gartner analysts expect Apple's share to drop in the next couple of quarters as the upgrade cycle to the iPhone 4S slows.

Even though Gartner analysts believe that iPhone share will drop in next couple of quarters, we think that they are wrong, as Apple will be launching iPhone 4S in 25 more countries this quarter, which should increase sales. It might drop quarter over quarter when compared to Q4 2011, but in year over year sales comparison with Q1 2011 when Apple sold 18.65 million iPhones, we should see another large jump.

You can read the complete report on Gartner’s website.