SINGAPORE — For all the effort that Taiwanese mobilephone maker HTC is putting into its handsets, the results are hardly satisfactory.

Even as Chief Executive Officer Peter Chou vows to garner between 10 and 15 per cent of the market share, it has not been able to do so thus far, said Global Head of Consumer Electronics Research at Euromonitor International Loo Wee Teck.

It did not even make it to the top five in last quarter’s list, according to market research ABI Research. Samsung holds top spot at 34.8 per cent, followed by Apple at 14.6 per cent then LG, Huawei and ZTE. HTC, at No 9, behind BlackBerry, only managed a 3.1 per cent share.

That is not to say HTC does not make good phones. The One smartphone launched earlier this year received rave reviews with technology newssite Techradar giving it five out of five and review site BGR calling it “gorgeous”.

Even the HTC Desire 600 Dual SIM and Butterfly S I had tried over the last two weeks were nothing short of amazing — even if browsing through the apps tend to be a little slow.

Both devices boast HTC’s Sense 5 experience and BlinkFeed, which delivers news from your social networks as well as from news agencies to your home screen. Watching videos on the crisp sharp screens on both devices were great, and audio was delivered competently through its BoomSound feature — which is also found on its flagship One handset. The battery on the Butterfly S was the best I have seen in a while.

Mr Naveen Mishra, Industry Principal for Telecom, Asia-Pacific, Frost and Sullivan added: “A delay in HTC One’s shipment also affected the company’s market share. The way of the market is if you don’t offer the device on time, people will move on.”

Singapore was one of the first few countries to get the One in April; a Glamour Red variant will be available from Wednesday (Aug 7) in time to celebrate our nation’s birthday.

Mr Loo added: “There’s no denying that its latest HTC One is an excellent product but it seemed to have read the market trend wrongly by launching a 4.7-inch flagship model while its competitors moved to 5-inch models.”

“HTC’s product line-up is also confusing — its Butterfly had IP rating but its successor, the Butterfly S dropped its weatherproof capabilities,” added Mr Loo. “Ultimately, HTC suffers from a lack of consistency — product lineup, specifications, product design, software upgrades and marketing message. Consumers just don’t know what HTC stands for as a brand.”

“The challenge for HTC is to quickly identify unique differentiators as its other competitors had wisen up to fact that both Samsung and Apple are dominating the market. Nokia wisely chose eschew Android in favour of Windows and bank on its strength of optical and its flagship models like the Lumia 925 and 1020 are marketed as point-and-shoot replacements,” said Mr Loo. “HTC must carve out a niche; whether its never-ending battery life, battle-ready tough smartphones, or customisation for individual consumsers.”

Mr Loo added: “Time is running out for HTC to get its mojo back especially as the market moves into 2014. A it stands now, even Samsung’s Galaxy S4 was disappointing (by its own standards) and offers nothing evolutional, just lots of gimmicky software enhancements.”

The HTC Desire 600 DualSIM is available at S$498 (without contract) and the HTC Butterfly S is available at S$988 (without contract).

The HTC One in Glamour Red will be available from tomorrow afrom S$968 (32GB, without contract).