June 6 (Bloomberg) -- Nokia Oyj, the world's largest maker of mobile phones, lost market share in advanced handset sales as Research In Motion Ltd.'s BlackBerry e-mail device and Apple Inc.'s iPhone gained, according to researcher Gartner Inc.

Nokia's first-quarter global market share of so-called smartphones fell to 45.2 percent from 46.7 percent a year earlier, Gartner said today in an e-mailed statement. Research In Motion increased its share to 13.4 percent from 8.3 percent. Apple grabbed 5.3 percent of the market with its iPhone music player and handset, which wasn't available a year ago.

Total shipments to end users gained 29 percent to 32.25 million units, led by North America where shipments more than doubled, Stamford, Connecticut-based Gartner said. More than one in 10 of all mobile phones sold globally in the first quarter were advanced models.

``Smartphone growth was driven by replacement markets such as Europe, and smartphone sales also benefited from continued growth in the U.S. market, which increased its regional share to almost equal sales in Western Europe,'' said Carolina Milanesi, research director at Gartner, in the release.

Research in Motion dominated the U.S. market with 42 percent share and Apple secured the second spot with 20 percent.

Below is a table of the five biggest smartphone makers by unit sales and market share in the first quarter of 2008, with comparisons from a year earlier. The figures were compiled by Gartner.

           Units Q1'08  Share Q1'08  Units Q1'07  Share Q1'07
            (millions)   (percent)   (millions)   (percent)
Nokia          14.59         45.2        11.65         46.7
RIM             4.31         13.4         2.08          8.3
Apple           1.73          5.3           --           --
Sharp           1.32          4.1         1.74          7.0
Fujitsu         1.32          4.1.        1.25          5.0
Others          8.98         29.9         8.23         33.0
Total          32.25        100.0        24.94        100.0

To contact the reporter on this story: Juho Erkheikki in Helsinki at jerkheikki@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: June 6, 2008 06:48 EDT