Korean phones, cars thrive in U.S.

Korea’s handset and car makers are standing out in the U.S. market, as they posted an impressive increase in sales in the third quarter despite global economic slowdown. 

Korean handset makers took over the majority of the U.S. market share in long term evolution smartphone sales, Strategy Analytics said Friday.

Korean smartphone manufacturers ― Samsung Electronics, LG Electronics and Pantech ― altogether sold about 5.7 million units out of 10.6 million LTE smartphones sold in U.S. in the third quarter, holding slightly more than 50 percent of U.S. market share, the American market research firm said.

Specializing in information and technology, the research firm reported that Samsung sold about 4 million units of smartphones, the largest in LTE smartphones sales in the third quarter.

Samsung surpassed Apple and Motorola in the third quarter LTE smartphone sales. The Korean smartphone maker sold about 3.3 times as many LTE smartphones in the U.S. than in the first quarter. 

Second to Samsung, Apple sold most LTE smartphones, or about 2.6 million units of iPhone 5.

Motorola that had been the bestseller of LTE smartphone in the second quarter fell to third in the third quarter, selling about 1.5 million units.

Analysts said that, apart from other technical reasons, the ongoing patent war between Samsung and Apple had been one of the sales-boosters, increasing the degree of Samsung brand-recognition globally, including in the U.S.

Other Korean smartphone makers ― LG Electronics and Pantech ― became the fourth and fifth bestsellers of LTE phones in the U.S. during the period, Strategy Analytics said. LG sold over 1 million units of LTE smartphones. according to the research firm.

It said the Korean tech company sold about 1.2 million units of LTE mobile phones, about four times as many as its 300,000 sales in the U.S. in the first quarter this year.

Breaking the 1 million mark means a lot to LG Electronics. It has now joined the other top three global makers of smartphone ― Samsung, Apple and Motorola ― to sell over 1 million smartphones in the U.S.

LG Electronics said its accumulative 2012 sales in the U.S. from January to September amounted to about 2.7 million units.

In the meantime, Samsung said worldwide sales of its Galaxy Note 2 devices have surpassed 3 million units since the company released the hybrid phone in late September.

The company said the 5.5-inch phablet, a hybrid of a smartphone and a tablet PC, shows a much faster sales increase compared with the previous model.

Korean carmakers also had a strong showing in the U.S. market.

Hyundai Motor and its affiliate Kia Motors attained 1 million units in vehicle sales in the United States for the second consecutive year.

While Hyundai and Kia broke the 1 million-unit mark based on sales between January and November last year, they achieved the record in October this year.

The companies sold about 1.06 million units for the first 10 months of 2012. Hyundai saw its sales came to 590,085 units on a year-on-year basis and Kia posted 477,366 units.

For the first time in 2011, the Korean carmakers became the fourth non-American automotive group, with yearly vehicle sales exceeding 1 million units in the U.S.

Hyundai Motor saw the sales of the new Avante, dubbed the Elantra in North America, surge more than 25 percent in the U.S. market this year.

Kia Motors, buoyed by brisk sales of the K5, dubbed the rise Optima there, posted a 35 percent in their combined vehicle sales.

Their collective market share in the U.S. is hovering 9 percent, compared to 8.7 percent a month earlier and 8.3 percent a year earlier.

While General Motors and Ford Motor are vying to be No. 1 in U.S. sales, Hyundai and Kia have been in close competition with three other players ― Chrysler, Toyota Motor and Honda Motor ― to capture third place.

By Kim Yon-se and Chung Joo-won
(kys@heraldcorp.com) ((joowonc@heraldcorp.com)