Global mobile phone sales totaled 816.6 million units in 2005, a 21% increase from 2004, as the leading vendors increased their share of the market, a Gartner survey said.
The survey said Nokia remained the worldwide leader with a 32.5% market share of all mobile phone sales last year. After a difficult 2004, Nokia was able to bounce back, and sold more than 80 million phones in the quarter, the Gartner survey said.
With sales just under 42 million units in the fourth quarter of 2005, Motorola retained the number two spot. It remained the preferred brand in North America and displaced Samsung from the number two spot in Asia Pacific.
Samsung remained in the third position in the fourth quarter with sales totaling 28.4 million units.
The top vendors accounted for 79.4% of worldwide mobile phone sales in 2005, the survey said.
In the fourth quarter of 2005, the mobile phone market remained strong with sales exceeding 235 million units.
In the Asia Pacific, mobile phone sales reached 56.4 million units in the quarter. Sales in the region were fuelled by key markets such as China and India.
In Western Europe, sales of mobile phones totaled 49.1 million units in the fourth quarter of 2005 and 164 million units in 2005.
In North America, the fourth quarter was a record quarter with mobile phone sales reaching 41.3 million units.