Despite the tough economic climate in 2009, the Middle East and Africa (MEA) mobile handset market grew, with shipments up 2.4% over the previous year.
“The MEA mobile handset market managed to rebound in the second half of 2009,” says Barti Rajan, a research analyst with IDC's mobile handsets programme for the Middle East, Africa, and Turkey.
“Traditional mobile phones were the main growth driver for the overall MEA market in 2009 as shipments of converged mobile devices (smartphones) slowed,” he explains.
Rajan notes, however, that the region's more mature markets, such as UAE and Turkey, bucked this trend and instead converged mobile devices drove the growth experienced in these markets.
"End-user preferences in the more mature markets of the region have increasingly shifted from simple voice telephony towards a greater usage of data and applications,” he explains. “Both handset vendors and carriers have been eager to meet this demand, despite ongoing economic challenges.”
IDC's research showed that in the overall MEA mobile handset market, Samsung and LG experienced strong growth rates during the year, with both vendors regularly releasing new models targeting almost every segment of the market.
In the process, they were able to gain considerable market share from their key rivals Sony Ericsson and Motorola, explains the research firm.
According to the IDC, the converged mobile market will continue to gain momentum as vendors increase the variety of offered devices and as prices continue to fall in 2010 and beyond.
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