Having made checks with Apple's supply chain, Wedge Partners' analyst Brian Blair has claimed the firm intends to sell 100 million iPhones globally across the course of 2011.

Such numbers would, in Blair's words, require 100 percent growth year on year, handing Apple 10 percent of the global handset market by the end of 2011.

"While a staggering number any way you look at it, our checks reflect full calendar 2010 builds in the 48-50 million unit range," Blair wrote in an investor note.

"We believe Apple remains the best-positioned company in the tech sector as we exit the year and look into 2011."

Spreading the wealth

Such success will spread beyond iPhone, in Blair's view, with the analysts claiming Apple is also gearing up to manufacture 45-48 million iPads in 2011.

To put that figure in some kind of context, Blair's own iPad estimate for 2010 is 13.5 million units.

"With the iPhone and the iPad, the company continues to experience tremendous product momentum across two core areas that we believe are still in the early stages of growth: with global handset units at 1.1 billion a year and the tablet opportunity still nascent."

Blair claims iPad's steep ascent in 2011 will largely be down to the predicted launch of iPad 2 at some point during the year.

It should be noted, however, that Blair's numbers are some of the most optimistic to date, and represent a fairly major leap in projections.

Throughout the course of the year, analysts have pitched iPad sales in 2011 at anywhere between 7 million and 28 million. 

The official total is currently around 7.5 million.

[source: Barrons]