According to the research firm Gartner Inc., the Android mobile platform from Google was running on over 50% of all the smartphones that were sold during the third quarter as consumers gobbled up handsets manufactured by Samsung Electronics, HTC and Motorola. The Google OS made up 52.5% of total smartphone sales, registering a growth of more than double in its share from a year ago, said Gartner in the report. Although some of the consumers delayed buying the Android phones to await the latest iPhone 4S from Apple, the sales of smartphones grew 42% in terms of volume. An analyst at Gartner, Roberta Cozza, said that Android profited from more offerings in the mass-market, weaker competition and the dearth of new and exciting products which were based on another platform.
Smartphones went up by one percentage point as compared to the last quarter to reach 26% of the total sales of mobile phones. The Symbian phones manufactured by Nokia dropped by over 20% as compared to last year to account for 16.9% of all smartphone sales as the company is making the transition to Microsoft’s Windows Phone mobile OS, which will be available on the phones which are scheduled to be shipped during this month.
Samsung, which manufactures the Galaxy range of smartphones based on Android, became the biggest manufacturer of smartphones for the first time ever during the quarter. Cozza stated during an interview that Android phones at the entry-level are improving their performance, and this will be the market segment which will drive increasing growth during the next year.
The global market for mobile handsets rose by 5.6% during the third quarter to reach 440.5 million phones, said Gartner. It slowed down from the growth of 35% which was reported during the last year and the 16.5% growth which was reported last quarter. Nokia still maintained its position at the top spot, with a market share of 23.9%, rising from the 22.8% during the second quarter.
The top five vendors included Apple, LG Electronics and ZTE Corp. The growth of smartphones slowed down from 74% during the second quarter, even as Russia and China continued strong growth. Gartner has forecasted a growth of 50% in the smartphone market for this year and an increase of 11% in the overall mobile handset market.
