Smartphone shipments drop in Q1  

MANILA, Philippines — Smartphone shipments declined in the first quarter due to a slowdown in demand,  according to the International Data Corp. (IDC).

IDC’s quarterly mobile phone tracker showed that shipments in the Philippines in the first quarter declined by 7.1 percent year-on-year and 21.6 percent quarter-on-quarter to 3.9 million smartphone units.

IDC attributed the drop to the ongoing supply constraints for low-end smartphones coupled with weakened consumer spending for mobile phones in the country.

“While 5G smartphones have increased to almost 20 percent of total shipments in the first quarter, 4G Android smartphones fell by 16.3 percent year-on-year and 24.4 percent quarter-on-quarter due to tight supplies, with smartphones priced less than $200 impacted the most,” said Angela Medez, market analyst at IDC Philippines.

Medez said supply disruptions are expected to challenge vendors in meeting their targets for 2022, but some improvements may be seen toward the end of the year.

“The silver lining could be the acceleration of 5G smartphones in the Philippines as vendors focus on their 5G portfolio to drive growth,” she said.

IDC said Realme was the smartphone market leader in the country during the period with a 20.2 percent share, maintaining its top rank for the fifth consecutive quarter.

IDC said rising brand Transsion secured the second biggest share of 19.8 percent as both its Tecno and Infinix brands launched their first 5G smartphones in the market, making up 11 percent of 5G shipments in the country.

Samsung accounted for a 16.8 percent share of the market after introducing several models at different price points.

Xiaomi and Oppo held the fourth and fifth biggest shares at 14.2 percent and 11.2 percent, respectively.