Despite some vendors seeing record smartphone sales, worldwide sales of mobile phones declined 2% year-over-year to 419.1 million units in the first quarter of 2012, according to research firm Gartner. The decline represents the first of its kind since the second quarter of 2009. “Global sales of mobile devices declined more than expected due to a slowdown in demand from the Asia/Pacific region,” said Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner. “The first quarter, traditionally the strongest ...

Samsung reported a blow-out first quarter on Friday as strong mobile phone sales helped the consumer electronics giant increase profits by 82% to a record 5.05 trillion won. The numbers were undoubtedly impressive as they stood, but market research firm Strategy Analytics helps us paint a broader picture of just how dominant Samsung’s mobile business was in the first quarter. On the smartphone side, Strategy Analytics estimates that Samsung sold a staggering 44.5 million smartphones into channels last q...

Consumer technology hardware sales in the United States fell 0.5% percent in 2011, ending the year just shy of $144 billion according to market research firm The NPD Group. Roughly 60% of all sales were from PCs, TVs, tablets, eReaders, mobile phones and video game hardware, NPD said. Computers generated the most revenue with nearly $28 billion or roughly 20% of sales, with tablets and eReaders doubling sales to $15 billion in 2011. For the second year in a row, Apple led all consumer electronics brands and w...

Gartner on Thursday issued its global mobile phone sales data for the second quarter, which shows that the industry grew 16.5% from the same quarter last year, to 428.7 million units. Smartphone sales jumped 74% year-on-year, with 107.7 million smartphones having been sold to end users around the world. “Smartphone sales continued to rise at the expense of feature phones,” said Roberta Cozza, principal research analyst at Gartner, in a statement. “Consumers in mature markets are choosing ent...

A recent survey found that 33% of Americans would sooner give up sex for a week than go without their mobile phones for the same period of time. Navigation software leader Telenav surveyed 514 mobile phone users in the U.S. last month to find out how willing they were to give up certain things ahead of their cell phones. Respondents were most willing to part with alcohol instead of their phones, with 70% saying they would go a week without booze before going a week without a phone. At the other end of the s...

Fujitsu announced on Thursday that it is now offering a new program called “Service Built for Android”. Fujitsu is leveraging its experience in the development of embedded devices and offering to help companies deploy the Android OS on all kinds of hardware, from  mobile phones, automotive systems and consumer electronics to embedded systems. Fujitsu will provide consulting, training, engineering and embedded middleware services intended to assist companies in fast tracking their products. For co...

That dude pictured above doesn’t look too happy, and who can blame him? He’s probably a tech geek, if not a Blackberry user who is sharing the worries and woes of the mobile telecommunications industry, which is heavily affected by the current economic downturn. With several banks and financial institutions being bailed out by the U.S. government, how can it not trickle down to the phone manufacturers and carriers? RIM is going to be a huge one since a big chunk of its market are the business type...

Hear that loud ringing around the world? Can you feel the good vibrations? The Beach Boys are pleased. The Wall Street Journal’s Adam Ewing reports that there are an additional 305 million mobile phones sold in Q2, 2008, representing 12% growth from the year before. That means there are nearly a third of a trillion more phones in the world interrupting theater productions and Bar Mitzvahs everywhere.Even though the growth seems substantial, it represents a slowdown from last year’s 21% rate. Much ...