Worldwide smartphone shipment is expected to reach 1.5 billion by 2017, accounting for about 73% of the total mobile shipments, according to a report from Canalys.
Over the next five years, almost all the phones that will be shipped to North America and Western European region will be smartphones, while 95% of the entire mobile phone shipment to China will smartphones, the report revealed.
Canalys principal analyst Chris Jones said that the price of smartphones has fallen dramatically over the last few years, which has helped increase in the shipments.
"But, so far, the problem with low-cost smart phones has been that the user experience has been compromised to hit lower price points," Jones said.
"As component prices continue to fall, vendors will be able to deliver great experiences on smart phones at low price points, which means that in many markets, feature phones will become extinct."
During the forecast period, the smart phone market is expected rise at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18%, while mobile phone shipment is expected to experience a 9% decline.
The Android based smartphone shipment is expected to double to over one billion by 2017 from over 470 million units shipped in 2012, representing a 67% of market share.
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During the period Apple’s shipment will continue to grow but at a slower rate 14.1% compared to 19.5% in 2012, due its absence in low end market where the market is experiencing momentum.
Compared to Apple, Microsoft’s market share is expected to grow from 2.4% to 12.7% during the period.
Canalys analyst Jessica Kwee said that Apple’s growth will be limited due to its absence in low end smartphone market, which is expected to drive the increase.
"Android’s continued dominance is due to the scalability of the platform." Kwee said.
"The scalability of Microsoft’s platform will be critical to its success and it has made progress here by enabling Huawei and Nokia to deliver Windows Phone products at aggressive price points."
In a separate report, International Data Corporation (IDC) revealed that that the worldwide smartphone shipments are expected to reach 958.8 million units in 2013, a 32.7% year over year rise against the 722.5 million units previous year, representing 52.2% of the total market share.
Strong demand from users combined with the variety of choice of devices available at multiple price points is expected to drive the growth, along with the transition of the simple voice telephony to data consumption as well as the smartphone becoming the tool for many users.
IDC Mobile Phones programme research manager, Ramon Llamas, said that 2013 will mark a watershed year for smartphones.
"If you look at the number of vendors who support both feature phones and smartphones, many of them have not only successfully transitioned their product portfolios to highlight smartphones, but smartphones have become their primary value proposition going forward," Llamas added.
"In some cases, smartphones have accounted for well over 50% of their quarterly shipment volume. Looking ahead, we expect the gulf between smartphones and features phones to grow ever wider."
