Cellphone shipments to top 800 million, research firm says

Reported cellphone shipments in the first half of the year as well as a continued increase in sales prompted iSuppli to revise its 2005 sales estimates for mobile phones. The research firm now believes that the industry will ship 810 million phones this year, up 13.4 percent from 713 million in 2004 - and up 9.5 percent from 740 million in the original forecast.

According to iSuppli, mobile-phone shipments in the third quarter of this year came in at 210 million units, exceeding the firm’s previous forecast of 201 million. iSuppli now predicts the fourth quarter will end with shipments of 239 million units, compared to 218 million before.

The higher than expected sales are being driven by growing demand in emerging markets as well as upgrade sales in maturing regions. Scott Smyser, principal analyst at iSuppli, said that phones that have features like MP3 players and digital cameras with 1 megapixel and greater resolution are driving such upgrade sales.