Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Canalys, a high-tech market trends research consultancy, has released a press release indicating an impressive growth for Android smart phones in markets around the world. Smartphone shipment data for Q2 2010 has shown a remarkable growth of Android device shipments across a range of handset vendors such as HTC, Motorola, Samsung, Sony Ericsson, LG and others. Shipments of smartphones running Android OS has grown an impressive 886% in Q2 2010.
The United States itself, being the largest smartphone market in the world, had a 41% market growth from last year with 14.7 million units accounting for 23% of global shipments in Q2 2010. Android devices collectively represented a 34% share of the US market in the quarter, and with growth of 851% Android became the largest smartphone OS in the country.
Although Android has shown progress, Nokia has retained a substantial lead in the worldwide smartphone market in Q2 2010, achieving a 38% market share. The vendor shipped a record 23.8 million smart phones during the quarter, representing growth of 41% on a year ago.
Despite Nokia leading the pack, other vendors are closing the gap. Shipments of RIM’s BlackBerry smartphones was placed second once again with an 18% market share and 41% growth. RIM also retained its leadership position in North and Latin America. Initial shipments of the iPhone 4 were predictably strong and contributed to Apple’s 61% growth and worldwide market share of 13% for the quarter.
The presence of Android smartphones are also growing in China and South Korea. China was the world’s second largest smartphone market in Q2 2010 for the sixth consecutive quarter, with shipments of 6.9 million units representing 11% of the worldwide total. The Android devices combined reached almost 475,000 units in Q2 2010 from no units just a year ago.
Though Nokia devices continue to dominate China’s market, Canalys expects Android to be among the platforms that will drive growth in the coming quarters. Android devices held a 7% share in China this quarter. Also, HTC, the world’s leading Android device vendor, announced last week that it is entering the Chinese market with its own-branded smartphones.
Sources:
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Nokia has just announced that the net sales in the second quarter of 2010 topped 10 billion euros across units. Also, it has shipped more than 111 million mobile devices, up 8% from Q3 2009. However, net income fell to 227 million euros, down from 380 million euros a year earlier. That’s a large 40% drop in net profits.
With total mobile device volumes at 111.1 million units, Nokia’s preliminary estimated mobile device market share was 33% in the Q2 2010, down from an estimated 35% a year ago and unchanged from an estimated 33% in Q1 2010.
Nokia converged mobile device (smartphone and mobile computer) volumes came in at 24 million units, a bit more than a quarter of total devices volume, up 42% year-on-year and 12% sequentially.
Source:
Weekend Mobile Industry Snippets!
The first real Symbian^4 screen shots have emerged. Nokia is expecting to use Symbian^4 in a few of its devices by early 2011. The Symbian Foundation has posted the first handful of home screen UI shots on its developer wiki recently showing redesigned widgets, app categories and search, pop-up menus, and a standard-issue numeric touchscreen keypad. Unlike previous Nokia’s concept videos, these are from a real emulator running real and actual codes.
Source:
http://www.engadget.com/2010/07/17/first-real-symbian-4-screen-shots-emerge/
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
ComScore has just released its smartphone market share report for March to May. The trend continues from previous months, with Android seeing the most significant growth in market share. There is a 4.0 percentage point increase, capturing 13.0 percent of smartphone subscribers.
Despite Android’s gain, RIM and Apple dominated, with RIM taking 41.7 percent share of U.S. smartphone subscribers, followed by Apple with 24.4 percent share. Microsoft saw a 13.2 percent share and Palm rounded the top five out with a 4.8 percent share. In total, 49.1 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the three months ending in May, up 8.1 percent from the corresponding February period.
In terms of manufacturer share, the report found Samsung to be the top handset manufacturer overall with 22.4 percent market share. LG ranked second with 21.5 percent share, followed by Motorola (21.2 percent share), RIM (8.7 percent share, up 0.5 percentage point) and Nokia (8.1 percent share).
For the three month period from March to May, comScore reports that 234 million Americans age 13 and older used mobile devices. Across the board, comScore’s numbers show mobile phone users in the U.S. are interacting more with their phones. In terms of actions, 65.2 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers used text messaging on their mobile device in May, up 1.4 percent versus the prior three month period. Mobile browsing also increased to 31.9 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers (up 2.3 percentage points). Subscribers who used downloaded applications comprised 30.0 percent of the mobile audience, representing an increase of 2.1 percentage points from the previous period. Accessing of social networking sites or blogs also saw growth, increasing 2.6 percentage points to 20.8 percent of mobile subscribers.
Although Android ssaw a gain in market share over the three month period, the platform is still far behind Apple’s mobile user base. Android still has a long way to go in terms of market share before it can be seen as a major competitor to Apple, but the platform is slowly gaining a larger user base, so who knows.
Source:
http://techcrunch.com/2010/07/08/comscore-android-continues-to-gain-smartphone-market-share/
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Appcelerator has just published the results from its most recent mobile developer survey and the results show what platforms and device types are most compelling to developers in the short term and for the long term as well.
In March, Appcelerator’s developer survey indicated that 53% of developers were interested in developing for the iPad. The most recent survey results however, show that that number has gone up drastically, with 84% of responding developers now saying they are “very interested” in developing for the iPad. Android held steady at 81%.
Appcelerator also asked developers to rate the major phone platforms, iOS, Android, BlackBerry and “Other” in a number of categories, including, “best app store,” “biggest market for consumer apps” and “most ‘open’ platform. Although Apple dominates the results, the last category: “This OS has the best long-term outlook.” shows that Android won this round with 54% of the vote. Developers think that Apple’s iOS has the best near-term outlook, but if we are talking about planning ahead for the future, Android’s openness and ability to run on many device types makes it a real contender in a larger picture.
Comparing the pros and cons of the different app platforms:
Source:
http://mashable.com/2010/06/23/mobile-developer-survey-iphone-4/
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Nokia is trying to defend its top position in the competitive smartphone market, by pushing the development of its mobile applications and services. This includes a new integrated Web TV service and roping in companies to provide localized content. They believe that applications and services will drive future sales of smartphones.
Vlasta Berka, GM of Singapore, Malaysia and Brunei, Nokia said: “Content, as people always say, is the king. We are engagaing developers directly to help them with the development keys, with the development tool kit. We are looking at areas such as helping them with consumer segmentation, to understand what are the behaviors and what is that customer using mobile devices for.”
Nokia is also counting on the Symbian OS for competitive advantage. It believes that the open source nature and dominance of the platform will allow it to reach the mass market more effectively and affordably.
Source:
http://www.channelnewsasia.com/stories/singaporebusinessnews/view/1063161/1/.html
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Apple questioned data showing smartphones using Google’s Android operating system surpassing iPhone sales in the United States, and said there are no signs that the competition is gaining in the smartphone market.
Apple said the NPD data didn’t provide a complete picture.
“This is a very limited report on 150,000 U.S. consumers responding to an online survey and does not account for the more than 85 million iPhone and iPod touch customers worldwide,” said Apple spokeswoman Natalie Harrison.
She said the iPhone far outsells Android on a worldwide basis, and pointed to a report from IDC last week which showed the iPhone with a 16.1 percent global market share, behind No. 2 RIM and No. 1 Nokia Oyj.
Source:
http://www.engadget.com/2010/05/11/apple-brushes-off-npds-smartphone-report-says-it-sees-no-sign/
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100512/ttc-tech-us-apple-android-96247d2.html
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
Smartphone shipments surged 50 percent in January through March versus a year ago, notching up the strongest growth in the last three years with Apple Inc and Nokia taking market share. This was the strongest period of growth for almost three years and the high-value smartphone market is leading the handset industry out of recession.
iPhone maker Apple’s market share leapt to 16.4 percent from 10.6 percent a year ago, while market leader Nokia raised its share to 40 percent from 38.2 percent. Blackberry maker RIM slipped to 19.7 percent from 20.3 percent.
Sources:
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE63T2A220100430
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/rtrs/20100430/ttc-tech-us-telecoms-smartphones-96247d2.html
Daily Mobile Industry Snippets!
The world’s top mobile phone maker Nokia released details of its first smartphone based on Symbian 3, the much-awaited updated version of its aging operating system.
The company’s shares took a hit when the group reported weaker-than-expected first quarter profits and gave a weak outlook, but said it had managed to boost its smartphone market share to 41 percent.
Source:
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/afp/20100427/ttc-finland-telecom-equip-nokia-0de2eff.html
