• Global sales of smartphones to end users totaled 366.2 million units in the second quarter of 2017, a 6.7 percent increase over the second quarter of 2016, according to Gartner, Inc.

In the smartphone operating system market, Android extended its lead with 87.7 percent market share, while iOS accounted for 12.1 percent.

"Although demand for utility smartphones remains strong, there is growing demand in emerging markets for 4G smartphones, with more storage, better processors and more advanced cameras. This is translating into higher demand for midpriced [$150 to $200] smartphones," said Anshul Gupta, research director at Gartner.

Sales of all types of smartphone grew in the second quarter of 2017, compared with the second quarter of 2016. However, there is a concern about rising component costs, as well as limited supply, due to the reduced availability of critical components. "We expect a shortage of flash memory and OLED [organic light-emitting diode] displays will affect premium smartphone supply in the second half of 2017," said Mr. Gupta. "We've already seen Huawei's P10 suffer from a flash memory shortage, and smaller, traditional brands, such as HTC, LG and Sony, are stuck between aggressive Chinese brands and the dominating market shares of Samsung and Apple in the premium smartphone segment."

Samsung's smartphone sales grew 7.5 percent, year over year, after three consecutive quarterly declines (see Table 1). The company had been hit hard by problems with the Galaxy Note 7, but the Galaxy S8 and S8+ are bringing back high demand for Samsung smartphones. "Despite growing competition from Chinese brands such as Huawei, Oppo and Vivo, we expect Samsung to register growth in 2017," said Mr. Gupta.

Despite clearing the distribution channel of iPhone inventory amounting to 3.3 million units during the second quarter, Apple's sales were flat (down 0.2 percent), year over year. "Apple's sales in emerging markets are expected to grow as older-generation iPhones continue to attract buyers. The new iOS 11, which will include augmented reality, machine learning, an improved Siri and a new display design, will likely fuel strong iPhone sales in the fourth quarter of 2017, and help Apple increase its sales in 2017," added Mr. Gupta.

Vivo and Oppo achieved the best performances in the second quarter of 2017, with year-over-year sales increases of 70.8 percent and 44.1 percent, respectively. Vivo's smartphones with front-facing cameras have carved out a niche for themselves. "Vivo maintained second place in China and grew its sales internationally," said Mr. Gupta. Similarly, Oppo secured its leading position in China by offering dual rear-facing and front-facing cameras.

Greater China and Emerging Asia/Pacific Markets Accounted for Nearly Half of Smartphone Sales

Greater China and emerging Asia/Pacific markets drove sales of smartphones in the second quarter of 2017, with market shares of (27.7 percent) and (21.4 percent), respectively (see Table 2).

Growing smartphone penetration of India, Indonesia and Southeast Asian countries drove a year-over-year rise in smartphone sales in the emerging Asia/Pacific group.

However, smartphone sales in Greater China declined, year over year, primarily due to longer replacement cycles and as users prefer to buy better smartphones. "Large vendors continued to strengthen their positions by increasing their market share, while smaller brands lost ground in Greater China," said Mr. Gupta.

Sales in Western Europe returned to year-over-year growth, fueled especially by strong sales of Huawei and Samsung smartphones.

Question: what happens when you cross Samba TV’s data from Smart TVs in 13.5 million U.S. households with Kantar Millward Brown’s 8 million Ignite Network® desktop panelists and 3 million mobile panelists? Answer: the opportunity to precisely measure the brand impact of TV advertising on the same basis as digital.

If you are not familiar with Samba TV here is what you need to know. Through an integration with 10 leading Smart TV manufacturers, Samba is integrated into the chipsets of Smart TVs across 13.5MM households in the U.S. Samba TV’s 1st party, owned and controlled audience data is 100 percent privacy compliant and FTC-approved with a 2-step opt-in process and easily accessible opt-out functionality.

This means that Samba TV’s Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) technology instantly recognizes any content playing on a Samba enabled TV, regardless of how that TV inventory was purchased (e.g. linear, addressable, OTT). Video fingerprinting matches TV ads in real-time to a database of 40,000 executions. This means passive ad exposure data is now available from SmartTVs, connected and mobile devices and set-top-boxes.

When a Brand Lift Insights study is conducted the exposure data is passed back to Kantar Millward Brown and exposed and control respondents are surveyed on brand and attitudinal measures to identify the lift in brand metrics between the two groups. This is essentially the same methodology that has become the industry standard for measuring the impact of online and mobile advertising but now applied to TV.

So what do we see in terms of results? Our initial Brand Lift for TV norms demonstrate that:

TV advertising is salient, even among the younger audiences who we tend to associate with mobile. On average exposure to TV advertising led to an 8.6 percent increase in TV ad awareness for 18-24 year olds, similar to other age groups.
Brand Lift for TV norms also quantitatively demonstrate that TV advertising builds predisposition with all age groups having significant increases in purchase intent. Biggest increases are among the 18-24 year old audience.

There will no doubt be a lot more learning about what works and what does not but no longer do advertisers have to infer whether their TV advertising helped build brand equity. Brand Lift Insights for TV helps identify the overall impact of the campaign and benchmark it against the industry. The findings can also demonstrate which elements of a campaign are working most effectively and how changes can be made to improve campaign effectiveness.

Written by Nigel Hollis,Executive Vice President and Chief Global Analyst at Kantar Millward Brown.

BBC Worldwide India has announced two personnel changes to up the ante of its production business here.

Soniya Kulkarni, in addition to her creative head position has been tasked with the job of business development. In her newly minted role ofCreative and Business Head, Productions, India, she will lead the charge in winning new business while continuing to oversee the productions and creative teams.

Deepali Handa has been promoted to Commercial Head, Productions, India. She continues to oversee BBC Worldwide India’s non-fiction production and production accounts as well as operational performance.

Soniya and Deepali will carry on reporting to Myleeta Aga, SVP and GM, South & South East Asia.

“BBC Worldwide already enjoys a reputation as a leading producer in India, making high quality and popular fiction and non-scripted content,” said Myleeta Aga, SVP and GM, South and Southeast Asia. “I am confident that their efforts, vision and creative force will enhance BBC Worldwide’s strategic growth and business here.”

BBC Worldwide in India recently won awards for its production of Jhalak Dikkhla Jaa (BBC Worldwide format of Dancing with the Stars) , Aaj Ki Raat Hai Zindagi (BBC Worldwide format of Tonight’s the Night) and Star Parivaar Awards. It also recently produced India Banega Manch, 2MAD, MTV’s Girls on Top, Taste Match and Spell Bee.

People come to Facebook to experience, share and talk about some of the most important moments happening in their lives, communities and around the world. Many of these moments are reminiscing past memories and moments between friends.

Since launching On This Day more than two years ago, we’ve learned that there are many different types of memories and moments that people enjoy revisiting and celebrating, which is why we are excited to share that we’ve added two new ways for people to relive meaningful memories and celebrate special moments on Facebook.

Recapping Your Memories

We’ve launched a new experience that packages your recent memories in a delightful way for you to enjoy and share. For related recent memories, we will bundle them into a monthly or seasonal memory recap story. Like On This Day, these memory recap stories will show up in News Feed and are shareable.

Celebrate Your Friendships

We’re launching a new way to celebrate the actions that connect you and your community on Facebook. There are two types of moments where you may see these celebratory messages – when you make a notable number of friends on Facebook, and when your friends have liked your posts. We plan to launch more messages like this in the next few months. Additionally, these messages are currently only shown to you, but will become sharable in the near future.

Updates to On This Day and Memory Preferences

We’ve received input from people over the past two years and have worked to improve On This Day, such as making controls and preferences easier to access. On This Day is one of Facebook’s most popular experiences and we’re excited that this feature is now available to everyone on Facebook.

Finally, we know that occasionally there are some memories that may spark negative feelings that you would rather avoid. We’ve invested a lot in developing ways to filter content that will select photos we believe may be the most relevant and enjoyable to you.

We know how much people cherish their friendships and memories, which is why we approach these experiences with sensitivity and care. Our goal is to create a supportive environment that allows you to express your feelings and connect with what matters to you and your community.

Written by By Oren Hod, Product Manager, Facebook

In a recent development, SBI Mutual Fund, the fifth largest (by AUMs) asset management company in the country recently appointed FCB Ulka as the Agency on Record for its creative mandate.

The account will be serviced from FCB Ulka Mumbai.

The account was awarded to FCB Ulka following a multi- agency pitch.

SBI Mutual Fund (SBI MF) has completed 30 years of successful operations in India. With a widespread network spreading over 165 branches across India, SBI MF has a strong and proud lineage that traces back to the State Bank of India (SBI) - India's largest bank. SBI MF is a Joint Venture between SBI and AMUNDI (France), one of the world's leading fund management companies.

Commenting on the win, Nitin Karkare, CEO, FCB Ulka, said, “We are thrilled to have the iconic and trusted brand- SBI MF on board! SBI MF is a magnanimous brand, however the category it operates in is challenging. We are delighted to bring alive the new chapter in story telling for the brand, marrying it with the trust the brand has garnered over the years. We look forward to a memorable journey and join hands in the endeavour- ‘a partner for life’ with the ‘never finished’ algorithm!”