Analysts: Cell phone sales fell in 2Q

NEW YORK -- A research firm says U.S. consumers bought significantly fewer cell phones in the second quarter.

The NPD Group said in a report Tuesday that 28 million cell phones were sold in the United States, a decline of 13 percent from the same quarter a year ago. That's the lowest number of phones sold in a quarter since NPD began tracking the category in 2005, said Ross Rubin, the firm's director of industry analysis.

However, the phones that were sold tended to be more expensive, and the total value of the market was down only 2 percent from a year ago, at $2.4 billion, according to NPD.

Motorola Inc.'s phones were the most popular, but its share of the units sold dropped to 21 percent, down from 32 percent last year.