IDC: Supply chain issues dragged down the smartphone market in the third quarter of this year

According to the latest report released by IDC on Thursday: The global smartphone market suffered a bigger-than-expected blow in the third quarter of 2021 - after achieving double-digit growth in the first half of the year, shipments fell by 6.7% in the third quarter. Market researchers blamed the supply chain disruptions that have long plagued many device manufacturers. After a period of relative relief, component shortages eventually had an adverse impact on many adjacent industries, including smartphones.

(Source: IDC website)

"It's fair to say that the smartphone industry has hardly ever been impacted by supply chain shortages, which until recently were not severe enough to cause a decline in shipments but rather limit its growth rate," Nabila Popal, research director for IDC's Mobile and Consumer Device Trackers, said in a statement.

Smartphone manufacturers shipped 331.2 million units in the third quarter of 2021. Although the seasonal decline in shipments was expected to be 2.9%, the actual decline was larger and varied by market region.

Central and Eastern Europe saw the biggest drop, at 23.2%, while the United States and Western Europe saw smaller declines, at 0.2% and 4.6%, respectively.

Samsung grabbed the top market share with 20.8%, but it was slightly lower than 22.7% in the same period last year, with shipments of 69 million units.

Apple ranked second with a 15.2% share, up from 11.7% a year ago, and shipped 50.4 million units.

Xiaomi regained the third place with a market share of 13.4% (13.1% last year), but its shipments of 44.3 million units were still 2 million units less than the same period last year.

In addition, the smartphone industry also faces other challenges, such as stricter COIVD-19 testing and isolation policies, which will continue to affect production in 2022.

Based on this, major suppliers have lowered their expected targets for the fourth quarter of 2021 and are doing their best to mitigate the impact.