According to research analysts at Strategy Analytics, global mobile phone sales continued to surge in the first quarter 2008, when shipments reached 282 million despite an economic downturn.Handset maker Nokia Corp. kept its top position, slightly increasing market share to 41 percent in the three months ended March 31. Samsung Electronics in South Korea remained at No. 2 — boosting its market share to 16 percent — while U.S. handset maker Motorola fell below 10 percent but stayed in third place.

According to the Strategy Analytics report, the Korean vendors LG and Samsung were the star performers, growing two to four times faster than the industry average while the anaysts see Motorola “in real danger of being overtaken by LG”.

Nokia sold 116 million handsets in the first. However, in the U.S. the market share of the Finnish mobile phone company dwindled from 20 percent to some 7 percent in just two years.

Strategy Analytics predicted that overall 290 million handsets will be sold worldwide in the second quarter 2008 — an increase of 12 percent over the same period in 2007 but a decrease of 14 percent compared with the previous three months.

via AP