UBS: Samsung to sell over 60 million smartphones in the fourth quarter

Brokerage firm UBS is forecasting that Samsung will sell 61.5 million to as many as 63 million smartphones in the current quarter. That would be at least a 5% increase from the 58 million sold in the third quarter, and is led by the Korean firm's red hot duo of the Samsung Galaxy S III and the Samsung GALAXY Note II. It would be the first time in corporate history that Samsung has sold more than 60 million smartphones in a three month period. UBS sees 7 million of the smartphones sold being the Samsung GALAXY Note II, which has already sold 3 million units. That is up from an earlier USB forecast that 5 million Samsung GALAXY Note II units would be sold in the quarter.

UBS expects 7 million Samsung GALAXY Note II units to be sold this quarter

UBS analyst Nicolas Gaudois says 15 million units of the flagship Samsung Galaxy S III will be sold this quarter with 5.5 million of them sold last month alone. More than 30 million Galaxy S IIIs have been sold since its launch last May. While the Samsung Galaxy S III continues to rack up sales, there is talk that the Samsung Galaxy S IV will be introduced at CES 2013 with a 5 inch display offering a 1080p resolution, which works out to a fantastic 441ppi pixel density. That matches the figures of the display on the just released HTC DROID DNA. As for the Samsung GALAXY Note III, the early water cooler talk is about a 5.8 inch screen with a pixel density in the 330ppi area.

The 61.5 million smartphones that UBS expects Sammy to sell from October through December include a range of low priced models, like the Samsung Galaxy Pocket, to high-end devices like the Samsung GALAXY Note II. There are some non-Android phones that are included, like a few bada flavored devices and the Windows Phone 8 Samsung ATIV S, but those are not expected to add too much to the total.

Samsung is currently the global leader in smartphone production, having surpassed Apple in the first quarter of this year when it sold 42.2 million units versus 35.1 million sold by the Cupertino based tech firm.