HTC share value slumps to seven-and-a-half-year low

Seven per cent drop for struggling Taiwanese phone giant

HTC's share value has dropped by seven per cent after Friday's announcement that the Taiwanese phone maker had suffered an 83 per cent profit drop compared to the second quarter of 2012.

Shares in HTC are now worth only $189, harking back to a period in HTC's history before its products captured the world's attention in the early Android era, with phones such as the HTC Desire series.

Since then, HTC's market share has been swallowed up by an ever-growing Apple, and Samsung's increasingly successful Android device offerings, led by the Galaxy series.

The HTC One has helped to net the company a $41.63m profit in the last quarter which, though an improvement on Q1 2013, has still resulted in the stock drop. A shortage of camera parts for the HTC One didn't help the company's fortunes in Q1, either.

HTC has had several executives leave the company this year, including COO Matthew Costello, Asia CEO Lennard Hoornik and chief product officer Kouji Kodera, all recently departing within weeks of each other.

Research company Gartner rated HTC the world's 10th largest smartphone company in terms of shipments by the end of 2012, with Samsung and Apple occupying the top two slots.