DESPITE slowing economies and falling sales worldwide, consumers are increasingly turning to feature-jammed smartphones, such as the iPhone and BlackBerry.

Samsung Mobile Display, a mobile display venture of Samsung Electronics, said on Sunday the global smartphone market was expected to grow to 500 million units in 2012 from 170 million in 2009.

Smartphones would account for 29 per cent of the entire mobile phone market in 2012, compared with 14 per cent in 2009, the company predicted.

According to a recent Australian study, 73 per cent of companies surveyed plan to increase the number of smartphones they use over the next two years.

The research, conducted by Jones Donald Strategy Partners on behalf of Optus, claims companies are investing in mobile technologies mainly to increase employee productivity.

Samsung Mobile Display, a 50-50 joint venture between Samsung Electronics and Samsung SDI, also expected touchscreens would be adopted by about 50 per cent of major portable devices - mobile phones, digital cameras, navigations and digital media players - to be sold in 2013.

It said growing smartphone sales and touchscreen adoptions would boost sales of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays, a small but fast-growing display segment.

Makers of screens for mobiles and portable gadgets pin hopes on premium displays for high-end mobile devices in the slowing market.

OLED panels are seen as a promising next-generation display as they are thinner and offer higher quality pictures than liquid crystal and plasma panels, but a shorter life span and high prices are drawbacks.

Samsung Mobile Display, the world's number one maker of active-matrix OLEDs, said the screen technology could appear on 50 per cent of all mobile phones within next five years.

Source: News.com.au (http://www.news.com.au/technology/story/0,28348,25357630-5014239,00.html)