(Reuters) – Apple’s long-awaited iPhone 4S and Samsung Electronics’ fresh, broad offering are likely to stand out in this holiday season’s smartphone sales which will otherwise be clouded by global economic uncertainty.

Last quarter we saw Apple losing its top position as the largest smartphone maker in the world to the number one contender, Samsung. But after the exquisite iPhone 4S launch, we expect the Cupertino-based manufacturer to gain the number one spot in a couple of months. Customers had to wait 16 months to get their hands on the new iPhone and most of them say it was worth it.

In the U.K., which is the leading indicator of the European Market, the iPhone sales took a 43% market share in the first month of the fourth quarter, taking over Android-based smartphones, according to a study performed by Kantar Worldpanel ComTech. Neil Mawston from Strategy Analytics told us that “It’s really only the iPhone family and the (Samsung) Galaxy family flying off the shelves. Everyone else is just picking up the leftovers.”

On the fourth and fifth position we have HTC and RIM, which were predicted to have weak holiday sales. Every end of the year is a key sales period, if not the most important part of the year since most people replace their smartphones for the holidays. The estimates indicate 142 million smartphones sold in the October-December period, an increase by 42 percent in comparison with 2010, according to a recent Reuters poll.

In western Europe, the sales weren’t as good as expected due to the tight economical situation, consumers delay their purchases according to their budgets, which are shrinking for the past 3 years. However, analysts predict no significant loss in sales for regular cell phone. Smartphone sales have been slowing down throughout this year, it seems that people are not that driven to upgrade their old gadgets.

Carolina Milanesi, an analyst for Gartner stated that “for Europe, Q4 will not be the usual bonanza. The economy is pushing consumers to be pickier,” pointing out to the advantage Apple and Samsung seems to be played out in this period. Since early October, the Apple sales have been on an ascending trend, the company estimated to sell over 28 million iPhone devices by the end of the year, a 70% surge from 2010.

In November, Samsung broke the annual record, boosted by its flagship model, Galaxy S II, sales reaching 10 million devices, information stated by the company a week ago. From the Reuters report, we cannot see the sales number for Samsung smartphones, but analysts predict the same numbers as Apple. On the other camp, Nokia seems to register negative results, the sales dropping by 31 percent compared to 2010, to 19 million units,  the new Windows Phone OS does not seem to take over the Symbian sales. HTC follows with 11 million units and RIM with 14 million.

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