iSuppli says China Q1 cellphone shipments up 9 pct

BEIJING, June 25 (Reuters) - Mobile handset shipments in China rose 9 percent to 57.8 million units in the first quarter from the previous quarter, driven by state stimulus programmes and lunar new year holiday spending, researcher iSuppli said on Thursday.

The domestic handset market in China -- the world's largest mobile market with over 600 million subscribers -- will reach 238.9 million units in 2009, up 7.8 percent from 2008, the research group said.

The cellphone industry saw its worst-ever quarter in the January-to-March period, with the global market shrinking 14 percent in value from a year ago and Nokia reporting its first quarterly pretax loss.

Despite the rise in shipments in the world's largest handset market, analysts expect the overall global market for handsets to fall about 10 percent this year.

Offering a bright spot, China's domestic handset shipments are expected to rise steadily, reaching 299.4 million units by 2013, iSuppli said.

China's Tianyu in the first quarter surpassed Motorola (MOT.N), to trail only Nokia (NOK1V.HE) and Samsung (005930.KS) in the domestic market.

Nokia leads with a market shares of 34 percent, while Samsung commands a 21 percent share, it said.

Motorola and Sony Ericsson have continued to lose market share during the past four quarters, said iSuppli.

In terms of handset manufacturers, ZTE Corp (000063.SZ) was the largest Chinese handset original equipment manufacturer in the first quarter with 7.2 million units shipped, followed by Huawei [HWT.UL], which shipped 6.6 million units, said iSuppli.

($=6.83 yuan) (Reporting by Kirby Chien; Editing by Ken Wills)