Samsung and Apple have taken the lead in terms of the smartphone market, which means that others such as HTC are going to have to start playing catch-up. And based on that, it is now being reported that HTC is going to be scaling things back as they move into the new year. That being said though, the report is coming by way of DigiTimes, so we take that as it comes.

According to what was in the report, HTC has “suspended development of a number of new models for 2013″ which in turn has been said to have reduced the visibility of its orders for handset components. This comes by way of some unnamed industry sources. And as one would suspect, HTC has declined to comment on the matter. We should also state that this DigiTimes report failed to mention any specific models. In other words, we are not entirely sure if this means HTC will be cutting back on Android or Windows Phone

Other details suggest that due to the cutbacks, HTC will actually see a 10-15 percent rise in smartphone sales during the first quarter of 2013 as opposed to the 20-30 percent growth that was previously expected. Granted, assuming the first bit about the cutting back proves to be accurate, then this lower rise in sales only sounds logical.

All said and done, maybe HTC cutting back on models will be a good thing for the company. Let’s just hope that the rumored M7 doesn’t end up as one of the handsets that gets a cut. Otherwise, while not a handset for 2013, they seem to have made a decent splash with the Droid DNA which launched a short while back with Verizon Wireless. Maybe cutting back and following-up with devices similar to the DNA will be the magic they need.