Samsung beats Nokia as biggest phone maker, outsells Apple

Samsung's having a good day, having sold more phones than Apple, and being declared a bigger manufacturer than Nokia, the Guardian reports.

The South Korean tech giant earned itself a whopping £2.75bn in the first quarter of this year (that's January, February and March, calendar fans), selling 22 per cent more mobiles than it did in the same period in 2011.

Number crunching bods Strategy Analytics reckon Samsung has now become the world's biggest phone maker, knocking Nokia off the top spot -- a position it's held since 1998.

Samsung's also sold more phones than Apple this year, flogging 44.5m of its shiny mobiles since New Year's day, while Apple sold 35m iPhones.

Samsung makes many affordable mobiles though, so while it's sold more actual devices, Apple's numbers are still highly impressive. Selling 35m mobiles at £500 a pop is no mean feat.

I'm awarding no prizes for guessing why Samsung's doing well when it comes to phones. It makes a tonne of different devices to fit all pocket sizes, and the company's current flagship S2 is still proving popular. Even the planet-sized Galaxy Note seems to be selling well.

The Galaxy S3 is just around the corner too, so unless the company manages to massively muck up its next mobile, expect Samsung to stay important in the smart phone world.

With the mobile market proving ludicrously competitive, it feels like it's becoming very tough for any company other than Samsung or Apple to make any money. But is there another company you think could trounce the two big hitters? Get future-gazing in the comments or on our Facebook wall.