Samsung increases market lead over Apple while Nokia slips further behind

Samsung has extended its position as the larger mobile phone vendor on the planet, pulling away from rivals Apple, Nokia and Research in Motion (RIM), while Symbian phone are still outselling Windows Phone devices.

Figures from Gartner showed that the South Korean firm has a market share of 22.9 percent as of the third quarter of 2012, up from 18.7 percent in the same period last year. This came on the back of increased sales of 97 million devices, up from 82 million.

Samsung extended its lead over Apple, although the iPhone maker also saw growth over the two periods, with sales rising from 17 million in Q3 2011 to 23 million in 2012, as its market share increased by 1.6 percent to 5.5 percent.

"Samsung really delivered an outstanding performance as its entire portfolio performs well in both the high-end of the market and in more emerging markets," Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner told V3.

"Apple had issues in this quarter as it only launch its iPhone 5 device at the end, so expect to see them grow back in the coming quarter, but Samsung is very well placed now."

However, while the two leaders saw their grip at the top of the market strengthen, other vendors were not so successful.

Nokia's market share slipped by 4.9 percent to 19.2 percent of the market, while sales declined from 105 million to 82 million, costing it top spot.

"Nokia's new Lumia devices should give the firm a boost in 2013, although it won't be until the second half of 2013 that we see strong evidence for this," added Gupta.