Samsung overtakes Nokia in cell phone shipments

London: South Korean mobile maker Samsung has overtaken Nokia to become the world’s largest maker of mobile phones, according to a report.

Research firm Strategy Analytics revealed that in the first quarter of 2012 Samsung shipped 93 million mobile handsets phones compared to almost 83 million by Nokia.

The firm said its IT and mobile communications division, which manufactures the smartphones, made an operating profit of 4.27 trillion won during the period, as revenues in the division surged 86 percent from a year earlier, The BBC reports.

Meanwhile, Samsung is facing stiff competition from rivals such as Apple and Taiwan”-based HTC.

Apple, which said earlier this week that it sold 35 million of its iPhones in the first quarter, is expected to launch a new version of its handset later this year.

According to the report, another area of concern for Samsung is likely to be its chip manufacturing unit, which is facing slow global demand for personal computers

Samsung”s memory-chip division saw its profits slide by 54 percent during the first quarter when compared with the same period a year earlier.