Worldwide mobile phone sales totalled 286.1 million units in the second quarter of 2009, a 6.1 per cent decrease from the second quarter of 2008, according to Gartner, Inc. Smartphone sales surpassed 40 million units, a 27 per cent increase from the same period last year, representing the fastest-growing segment of the mobile-devices market. The recession continued to suppress replacement sales in both mature and emerging markets.

Nokia and cellity have announced an agreement for Nokia to acquire certain assets of cellity. cellity is a privately owned mobile software company which employs 14 people in Hamburg, Germany.

Nokia has posted its second quarter results yesterday. The company used its second-quarter results announcement to talk up its Internet services strategy once again, unveiling a target to have 300 million users of its mobile services by the end of 2011. Nokia has put a huge focus on its strategy of combining “services with high-quality devices” as it faces competition from traditional device manufacturers as well as new competition from the PC and Internet industries.

Nokia and Accenture have entered into an agreement for Accenture to acquire Nokia’s Symbian Professional Services unit responsible for Symbian OS customer engineering and customer support. The unit provides engineering consulting and product development services on a global basis to mobile phone manufacturers, as well as chip manufacturers and mobile operators.