Samsung: We’re on track to ship ten million Galaxy S II phones by end of 2011

By all accounts, Samsung’s Galaxy S smartphone family has risen to become the most serious challenger to Apple’s iPhone. Sales are picking up and Samsung now has the momentum to ship some ten million Galaxy S II units by the end of this year. This came from the mouth of Andy Tu, Samsung Taiwan’s president of mobile communications unit. Tu told DigiTimes, an Asian trade publication:

Global sales of the Galaxy S II are expected to top six million units by the end of September 2011 and 10 million units by the end of the year.

Considering the Galaxy S II hasn’t yet hit the U.S. with full force, ten million units is a pretty impressive number. That Samsung is aiming for four million units in the holiday quarter is especially telling in the face of sales blockade imposed in some countries as a result of Apple’s patent and design complaints.

Samsung sold three million Galaxy S II pre-orders worldwide early May and about 120,000 units in the first few days of availability in South Korea. It took the company 85 days to ship five million units in late July. Strong phone sales are seen as a boon to Samsung’s declining television and semiconductor operations which are blamed on a 26 percent drop in the June quarter profits.

Samsung today launched the Galaxy R in Taiwan, basically a rehashed Galaxy S version running Nvidia’s Tegra 2 chip instead of Samsung’s own speedy Exynos 4210 processor. The device is coming to North & Eastern Europe, South East & West Asia, Middle East Asia and China soon.