Or at least according to market research firm Gartner Inc., they did. Gartner has said that worldwide mobile phone sales to end users totaled 1.75 billion units in 2012, a 1.7 percent decline from 2011 sales.

"The last time the worldwide mobile phone market declined was in 2009," said Anshul Gupta, principal research analyst at Gartner, in a statement. "Tough economic conditions, shifting consumer preferences and intense market competition weakened the worldwide mobile phone market this year."

Gartner does see a resumption of mobile phone sales growth in 2013 but driven by the fast ramping smartphone and hindered by all other classes of mobile phone. Gartner predicts that sales of worldwide smartphone sales to end users will be close to 1 billion units in 2013, and overall mobile phone sales to end users are estimated to reach 1.9 billion units.

Samsung's resources and ability to build a broad market reach is an advantage that no other competitor can easily match. However, the competition will intensify in 2013 as players such as Sony and Nokia improve, said Gartner. "With Samsung commanding over 42.5 percent of the Android market globally, and the next vendor at just 6 percent share, the Android brand is being overshadowed by Samsung's brand with the Galaxy name nearly a synonym for Android phones in consumers' mind share," said Gupta.

In the fourth quarter of 2012, Nokia’s handset sales improved as a result of a good consumer response to its Asha mobile phones and the launch of the latest Lumia Windows Phone 8 models. It was not sufficient to stop Nokia to lose further market share, totaling 18 percent, the lowest it has ever been.



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Worldwide mobile phone sales to end users by vendor in 2012 (thousands of units). Source: Gartner (February 2013).