In the second quarter, Android took a 68% market share of all smartphones shipped worldwide.
This is according to data released by the International Data Corporation (IDC) in its Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker report. IDC attributes Android's success in the market directly to Samsung, which accounted for 44% of all Android shipments during the quarter to June.
Other reasons cited for the strong quarterly results include the release of several flagship models from handset partners, pricing for multiple budgetary needs, and improved user experience.
Together, Android and iOS accounted for 85% of all smartphone shipments in the second quarter. Kevin Restivo, senior research analyst for IDC, says: “The mobile OS market is now unquestionably a two-horse race due to the dominance of Android and iOS.
“With much of the world's mobile phone user base still operating feature phones, the smartphone OS market share battle is far from over. There is still room for some mobile OS competitors to gain share, although such efforts will become increasingly difficult as smartphone penetration increases.”
According to the report, BlackBerry and Symbian are on 4.8% and 4.4% market share respectively. The Windows Phone platform is posing a substantial threat to BlackBerry, closing in on the number three OS spot, according to IDC.
“The share gains it made last quarter are due mostly to Nokia, which almost doubled its Lumia/Windows Phone shipments sequentially. Though it's closing in on the third spot, Windows Phone is still a distant competitor to Android and iOS.
“Microsoft will need to generate additional momentum from Windows Phone 8 devices, which will be introduced this fall, if it is to narrow the share gap further between itself and the three mobile OS leaders.”
While iOS cannot compete with the diversity of the Android offering, the platform still recorded double digit growth.
“Demand for Apple's flagship smartphone has cooled off now that the device has been available since October, and the rumours around the blogosphere have fuelled speculation about a new design and features. Despite these trends, iOS remained the solid number two operating system behind Android worldwide, and greater than the total number of smartphones on the remaining platforms,” says IDC.
Dangerous decline
BlackBerry has seen a year-on-year decrease in market share of 40.9%, dropping from 11.5% in the second quarter of 2011, to 4.8% now.
“BlackBerry has lost significant share to other operating systems in the consumer and enterprise segments. Now that RIM has delayed the release of new BlackBerry 10 smartphones to 2013, BlackBerry remains vulnerable to the competition,” says IDC.
The sharpest drop is, however, attributed to Symbian - which used to be the world's most shipped OS. “The 62.9% drop registered was its sharpest year-over-year drop ever. The decline of Symbian, precipitated by Nokia's decision to make Windows Phone its primary smartphone OS, has accelerated due to lower sales in key economically developing geographies such as China, as well as Central and Eastern Europe and the Middle East and Africa.”
Local figures
On the local front, the latest findings from the Mobility 2012 report by World Wide Worx show Nokia still takes the lion's share of SA's cellphone market. BlackBerry and Samsung both have 18% market share.
In terms of smartphone usage though, in SA, 21% of mobile phones sold last year were smartphones. This is double the figure of 2010, but still significantly behind the 50% penetration seen in mature markets such as the US and Europe.
The rapid growth of smartphone usage in SA is largely attributed to BlackBerry - which has an estimated 75% share of the local smartphone market. According to World Wide Worx, there are about 4.5 million BlackBerry handsets in SA, and the iPhone is far behind with below half a million users. Android is estimated to have just under one million users in SA.
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