On CE - For Dealers, Distributors and OEMs of Consumer Electronics throughout EMEA

You are cruising on the high seas in a ship stuffed with 3D TVs... Suddenly, a shout goes up, "Connected TV off the starboard bow..."

..and everyone aboard rushes to starboard and the entire ship starts to tilt dangerously towards the water line, endangering all...

Welcome to the Smart TV Wars.

It's the Age of Disruption. And all the traditional forms of content delivery have been sunk. The web disrupted the news business by firing a broadside volley against newspaper publishers. iTunes fired a shot from the good ship Apple's armoury, blasting the traditional music business model out of the water. The App Store and the humble app torpedoed the packaged software business for everyone. PC gaming is now under siege from disruption.

Everyone in the Age of Disruption suffers from Apple envy. CE companies like Samsung, Sony, LG and others would like to claw back market share, with each introducing app stores that mirror Apple's tried and tested model.

Incumbent TV makers have watched apps...the next-generation of software...already alter the mobile phone business forever (henceforth... the smartphone business.)

That's why LG joining the Net TV consortium is so important.

Samsung is the top WW smartphone vendor for Q3 2011 according to Strategy Analytics, beating Apple from a units-shipped standpoint and claiming 23.8% market share.

Global smartphone shipments are on the rise in general-- reaching 117M units and growing by 44.4% Y-o-Y (slower growth compared to Q3 2010, when the market saw 86.5% Y-o-Y growth).

Samsung shipments total 27.8M units in Q3 2011, while Apple ships 17.1M units and slips in market share (from 17.4% in Q3 2010 to 14.6%) and growth (21% Y-o-Y, the lowest in 2 years according to Strategy Analytics).

The analyst attributes the Samsung growth to "a blend of elegant hardware designs, popular Android services, memorable sub-brands and extensive global distribution."

Nokia comes in 3rd place, with 14.4% market share (down from 32.7% a year earlier) and shipments reaching 16.8M units. Strategy Analytics says the newly announced Lumia portfolio should help raise the company's profile while driving "at least an L-shaped recovery in its global smartphone market share over the next few months."

Go Strategy Analytics

Sony buys the Ericsson share of Sony Ericsson for €1.05 billion, with the two companies parting ways from a joint venture lasting around 10 years.

Sony also gets ownership of 5 patent families and an IP cross-licensing agreement.

The purchase kicks off what Sony calls the "four-screen strategy"-- linking smartphones, laptops, tablets and TVs with Sony network services such as Playstation Network and Sony Online Entertainment through similar interfaces and operating systems.

The deal will also allow the Swedish Telefon AB L.M. Ericsson to focus on what it does best-- selling wired/wireless broadband hardware and managed services as it competes against Chinese giant Huawei.

Go Sony to Acquire Ericsson's Share of Sony Ericsson

TV demand in European markets is falling short of expectations according to the latest DisplaySearch market forecast, with WW TV shipments not set to show grow from 2010 to 2011.

Global TV shipments will total 248M units-- with LCD TVs accounting for 206M and plasma TVs for 17M.

"Persistent economic problems have made consumers cautious in their spending and highly value-seeking,” DisplaySearch says.

The flat forecast is the result of lower 2011 business targets from TV makers, as well as lower than expected key TV component demand during the period leading to the holiday season.

Flat panel TV shipments (excluding CRT and rear projection units) will still see growth in 2011-- by around 6% Y-o-Y, before increasing to around 9% in 2012, thanks to low-cost sales in emerging markets spurring CRT TV replacement.

LCD TVs will account for more than 80% of global TV shipments, even if the latest 2011 shipment forecast (206M units) are lower than previous estimates despite dropping LCD panel prices.

Meanwhile the plasma category is slowing down, with a forecast -6% Y-o-Y decline for 2011-- and double-digit unit shipment declines each quarter until H2 2012.

OLED TV will debut "around late 2012" within the 40" category, but will only manage to hold around 2.5% of the 40"+ category by 2015 due to high prices and limited availability.

Finally, 3DTVs account for 14% of shipments in W. Europe, and DisplaySearch expects WW 2011 3DTV shipments to total 22M, before growing to over 100M by 2015.

Go DisplaySearch Quarterly Global TV Shipment and Forecast Report