TechTaffy

tech:

taffy

Worldwide Smartphone Shipments To Cross One Billion This Year

By TechTaffy Desk

Android

Worldwide smartphone shipments are expected to surpass one billion units in 2013, representing 39.3% growth over 2012, says IDC. Despite a number of mature markets nearing smartphone saturation, the demand for low-cost computing in emerging markets continues to drive the smartphone market forward, according to the research agency. By 2017, total smartphone shipments are expected to approach 1.7 billion units, resulting in a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.4% from 2013 to 2017.

A number of trends co-exist in the global smartphone market, but none have more of an affect on driving market growth than the steady decline in average selling prices (ASPs), says IDC. Android has enabled a number of new manufacturers to enter the smartphone market supported by a variety of turnkey processing solutions. Many of these handset vendors have focused on low-cost devices as a way to build brand awareness. In 2013, IDC expects smartphone ASPs to be $337, down -12.8% from $387 in 2012. This trend will continue in the years to come and IDC expects smartphone ASPs to gradually drop to $265 by 2017.

Ryan Reith (Program director, IDC): Just a few years back the industry was talking about the next billion people to connect, and it was assumed the majority of these people would do so by way of the feature phone. Given the trajectory of ASPs, smartphones are now a very realistic option to connect those billion users.

From a volume perspective, emerging markets including Asia/Pacific, Latin America, and Middle East and Africa (MEA) are expected to post market-beating growth rates from 2013 to 2017. Asia/Pacific will also experience some market share growth from 2013 to 2017. Developed markets, by contrast, will see market share erosion, but will nonetheless see volume increases during the same time period, according to IDC.

From a price perspective, ASPs in these same emerging markets will post single-digit CAGR declines from 2013 to 2017, led by Asia/Pacific. This will enable more users to afford smartphones for the first time, and in many cases, allow users to bypass purchasing feature phones altogether and go straight to smartphones, says IDC. 

[Image courtesy: Google]

Just in

Series A

Tembo raises $14M

Cincinnati, Ohio-based Tembo, a Postgres managed service provider, has raised $14 million in a Series A funding round.
Around the web

Raspberry Pi is now a public company — TC

Raspberry Pi priced its IPO on the London Stock Exchange on Tuesday morning at £2.80 per share, valuing it at £542 million, or $690 million at today’s exchange rate, writes Romain Dillet. 
Fundings

AlphaSense raises $650M

AlphaSense, a market intelligence and search platform, has raised $650 million in funding, co-led by Viking Global Investors and BDT & MSD Partners.
Around the web

Elon Musk’s xAI raises $6B to take on OpenAI — VentureBeat

Confirming reports from April, the series B investment comes from the participation of multiple known venture capital firms and investors, including Valor Equity Partners, Vy Capital, Andreessen Horowitz (A16z), Sequoia Capital, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal and Kingdom Holding, writes Shubham Sharma. 
IT

Capgemini partners with DARPA to explore quantum computing for carbon capture

Capgemini Government Solutions has launched a new initiative with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to investigate quantum computing's potential in carbon capture.