Apple’s iPhone held onto a 13.7% share of global smartphone unit sales in Q2 2009, outpacing Microsoft’s Windows Mobile, which now claims just 9% of the market, according to Canalys.
Canalys specialises in delivering high quality market data, analysis and advice to the world’s leading technology vendors. The results of their research can be summarized as follows:
1. Nokia maintains global lead, although its performance varies by region
2. Touchscreens become the preferred interface, representing 40% of all shipments
3. Apple’s success continues, as the iPhone takes 23% of the North American market
4. RIM continues to gain share, succeeding with its push into the consumer market
5. Operating system choices are proliferating, primarily at Microsoft’s expense
“Apple has revolutionized the smart phone sector, leapfrogging more experienced rivals,” Canalys senior analyst Pete Cunningham said in the company’s report. Sales in the second quarter did not include much of the surge in new sales spurred by the release of the iPhone 3GS.
Apple’s iPhone in just two years has surpassed all Windows Mobile sales put together as well as the remains of the once significant Palm. Apple’s rapid success is particularly noteworthy when compared to Google’s free Android platform, which in a similar period of time has only managed to leave its brand on 2.8% of the smartphone market.
Chris Jones, a Canalys VP and principal analyst, wrote that “independent application providers face the cumbersome process of porting apps to multiple operating systems. The main loser has been Microsoft’s highly standardised Windows Mobile platform. Its smart phone market share has now fallen below 10% and the trend is likely to continue as many of its OEM partners, including HTC, Motorola and Palm, are focusing investment on other platforms.”
A solution to this problem are cross-platform frameworks such as Rhodes and PhoneGap.
Canalys is recognised as a key provider of continuous advisory services and confidential custom projects for marketing managers and strategists within blue-chip IT, telecoms, navigation and consumer electronics companies. It has unrivalled expertise in routes to market for all kinds of high technology products and services in the consumer, SMB and large enterprise segments, and provides worldwide market data and trends analysis.