After releasing its fourth quarter financial figures for 2013, LG announced in February that it sold a record number 13.2million Smartphones, with a whopping 47.6million shipped in 2013 as a whole.
It should be noted that these figures are shipping figures, not sales numbers.
Each quarter is as follows:
- First Quarter: 10.3million
- Second Quarter: 12.1million
- Third Quarter: 12million
- Fourth Quarter: 13.2million
These numbers are up 54 per cent from the fourth quarter of 2012. The company has seen most of the growth in shipping numbers on 4G/LTE phones, which are up 110 percent year-on-year. This is thanks to its flagship LG G2 and stripped-down Nexus 5.
Despite this success, the Korean giant saw a net loss of $59.3million in the fourth quarter, where they secured $13.8 billion in sales revenue. In their quarterly report, LG claim this is a result of “higher brand marketing expense and intensified price competition in the market.”
LG expect the Smartphone market to grow at a continuous rate throughout 2014, especially the LTE phone market. However, they recognise that the overall market competition will be intensified due to diversifying consumer’s needs and intensifying price competition as a result of the Smartphone’s extension into the mass market. Additionally, LG predict that the OLED TV market will pick up in 2014, gradually replacing the LED TV market, with Ultra HD TV to penetrate more into the mass market.
