By Kim Yoo-chul
Staff Reporter
South Korea's Samsung Electronics, the world's second-biggest handset vendor, is forecast to sell over 50 million of its full touch-screen phones on the global market ― two years since it jumped into the sector, last year.
Samsung, the runner-up to industry leader Nokia, said Sunday that it expected to sell 43 million full touch-screen phones by the end of this year worldwide thanks to rising demand for such devices on European and North American markets.
"In just two years, Samsung will pass over a combined 50 million sales mark for our touch screen-based devices," a company spokesman said, adding that Samsung sold 10 million full touch phones in 2008.
On a model basis, the company has sold 10 million "Start" phones since its initial debut in Europe in May, last year, while some 9 million "Touch Wiz" mobiles have been sold.
By region, the company sold 19 million full touch phones in Europe, while Asia's most valuable technology company sold 6.3 million, 3.4 million and 3 million in the United States, China and South Korea, respectively, Samsung said.
According to predictions by Strategy Analytics (SA), a consulting firm, the global demand for full touch-based mobile phones is estimated at some 120 million.
Samsung plans to sell over 250 million mobile phones in 2010, an increase of some 20 percent from this year's estimated 210 million, company sources said.