The Sri Lanka mobile phones market recorded sales of over 2 million units in CY 2011, CyberMedia Research.

In its Sri Lanka Mobile Handsets Market Review 2011, June 2012 released on Monday the New Delhi based IT and Telecoms market intelligence firm said that the total value of the mobile phones shipped in the Sri Lanka market during CY 2011 aggregated to LKR 22.4 Billion (US$ 202.7 million).

In the overall Sri Lanka mobile handsets market, Nokia emerged as the market leader with a 46% share, followed by Samsung at second position with 22% and Micromax at third position with 16%, in terms of unit sales during CY 2011.

Multi-SIM mobile handset shipments accounted for 35% of the total Sri Lanka mobile handsets market during CY 2011. Micromax emerged market leader in the category with a 37.3% share of unit shipments in CY 2011, followed by Nokia and Samsung with 24.6% and 15.9% shares, respectively.

Sri Lanka, the first country in South Asia to introduce 3G services in August 2006, is poised for significant growth in its telecommunications sector, buoyed by the end of the civil war in 2009.

Total 3G phone shipments in Sri Lanka touched nearly 0.32 million units during CY 2011. Nokia emerged as the market leader in this category with a 53.2% share of units shipped, followed by Samsung and Sony Ericsson with 25.6% and 7.7%, respectively.

"With the spread of 3G services to all major cities Sri Lanka consumers would look to acquire and use more feature rich mobile handsets, thus fueling greater demand for higher generation air interface devices. This is an opportunity that vendors and service providers can exploit by bringing to market attractive value for money device plus service packages", said Naveen Mishra, Lead Analyst, CMR Telecoms Practice.

Smartphone shipments touched 0.11 million units in Sri Lanka during calendar year 2011. Samsung emerged as the leader in the smartphone segment with a 27.6% share of shipments in CY 2011, followed by Nokia with 25.4%. HTC occupied third place with an 11.4% market share.

The Average Selling Values of smartphones during CY 2011 was LKR 45,350 (US$ 410). Android emerged as the leading smartphone OS with a 49.9% share of shipments in 2011.

"Going forward, vendors would do well to introduce handsets that support Sinhalese, as Sri Lanka would be a natural market for the same. Further, given the wet and humid climatic conditions that prevail in most parts of the country for most of the year, there could be a latent demand for water and moisture resistant handsets", stated Tarun Pathak, Analyst, CMR Telecoms Practice.

"With increasing operator focus on data revenues and better 3G coverage the share of smartphones is likely to increase and consequently the number of models on offer from smartphone vendors are also expected to go up in 2012", Tarun added.