Apple is squeezed by Android as smartphone market expands Mawston noted Samsung sales grew 56 per cent from a year ago to 76 million smartphones, while Apple's growth was just 20 per cent, less than half the industry pace of 47 per cent. The research group said Samsung's operating profit for its handset division was $5.2 billion in the second quarter of 2013 to $4.6 billion for Apple. "Apple's reign as the world's most profitable handset vendor lasted almost four years," Mawston said. He predicted the California firm will bounce back. "This is the cyclicality of Apple," Llamas said. By September or October we will see a new iPhone and unit sales are going to go through the roof again. He said Apple did better than expected in the past quarter with sales of 31 million iPhones, as it added carriers in the US and other markets. There is still demand. They are still adding operators," he said. I'm pretty patient with Apple. The reports included no breakdown of smartphones by operating system, but suggested Android made further gains, after holding some 75 per cent of the market earlier in the year. Llamas said BlackBerry, which saw its share shrink to some three per cent earlier this year, "is still in relaunch mode" and has yet to come up with "a deeper and broader portfolio." He noted that Windows Phone sales are picking up, with Nokia's Lumia -- the most important brand using the Microsoft operating system -- showing some gains with around seven million units sold. "That's still small, but it's a step in the right direction," he said.