Samsung Galaxy S4 shipments to reach 80 million in 2013: Analyst

Samsung Galaxy S4 has achieved the feat of being Samsung's fastest selling smartphone clocking 10 million shipments since its launch in April. However, it looks like the Korean major's flagship smartphone is expected to break new records, selling 80 million units this year, as per an analyst.

In a research note (via BGR) to clients, RBC Capital Markets analyst Mark Sue predicts that at the current pace, the Galaxy S4 is likely to cross 20 million shipments in the second quarter of 2013, and could clock 80 million shipments in the calendar year. The analyst offered some perspective comparing the Samsung Galaxy S4 shipments with that of the Galaxy S III. He mentioned that the Samsung Galaxy S III took two months to reach 10 million unit shipments while the Galaxy S4 shipments has crossed 10 million in the first month of its availability. The firm's prediction is based on the assumption that Samsung will also launch the Galaxy Note III in September and Apple will launch the iPhone 5S and iPhone mini.

Samsung had announced that it had shipped 10 million Galaxy S4 smartphones since its launch in April, last week. The phone is already selling in 60 countries and Samsung plans to expand sales to 327 carriers in 155 countries by June.

Samsung had unveiled the Galaxy S4 smartphone on March 14. The phone sports a 5-inch full-HD screen with a resolution of 1080x1920 pixels, and pixel density of 441ppi. It is powered by 1.6GHz Exynos octa-core processor in some regions, and a 1.9GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon quad-core processor in others. It has 2GB of RAM and a PowerVR SGX544MP3 triple-core GPU.

The smartphone comes in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB variants but will also feature a microSD card slot for expanding the memory. The Galaxy S4 sports a 13-megapixels rear shooter and a 2-megapixel one on the front. The Galaxy S4 also offers more camera features including dual-shot, employing the use of both front and back camera, an eraser shot mode to remove people from photos, and a Cinemagram like feature called Cinema Photo, among several other tricks. It also offers a number of sensors including a temperature and humidity sensor and motion and gesture control features.