By Jo Best, 2 March 2006 16:10
NEWS
Smart phones will soon make up a sizeable chunk of the mobile phone market, analysts believe.
According to a new report from ABI Research, smart phones will capture almost 15 per cent of the global mobile market this year - that's some 123 million devices.
ABI puts the upswing in smart phone sales down to more appealing devices that shy away from clunkier form-factors, as well as increasing interest in data services and the spread of the 3G coverage necessary to run many of them.
The gradual convergence of mobile and PC functionality also looks likely to continue, with ABI predicting that by 2010 a quarter of all smart devices will be packing embedded wi-fi.
The operating systems powering the devices will also come to play an important part in the development of the market, the analysts said, with both Linux and Windows Mobile devices expected to up their market share in the future.
Comments
There are 2 comments. Join the discussion
1. B Shah
You need to include the statement that at the moment Symbian dominates the market. They also have the most expertise in making Symbian work around the world on different networks. The OS issues is not just about applications. For example, there is only one Windows Mobile 3G device at the moment compared to many running Symbian.
2. Dean Bubley
The main issue isn't "Symbian dominating the market", it's that the vast bulk of "smartphones" are just typical mid-to-high end Nokia Series 60 devices, bought because they're Nokias, not because they're smart. Most users wouldn't know if they were powered by Symbian, Microsoft, Linux or a hamster on a wheel.
Also, I expect the bulk of Linux-based phones will actually be locked-down "featurephones", not fully-open OS devices where the user can install additional applications.