Watch out Apple, Android isn’t just nipping at your heels — it’s overtaking you. At least that’s what the latest figures from The Nielsen Company show.
Nielsen reports that multipurpose smartphones that let users surf the web, read e-mail, run apps, and share text and picture messages make up 25 percent of the U.S. mobile market. That’s up from 23 percent in the last quarter.
Call it the year of the smartphone, with Nielsen predicting smartphones will finally overtake feature phones in the U.S. by the end of 2011.
But will Apple, Android or Research In Motion lead the charge? What about Nokia, Microsoft and even Palm, which is now owned by Hewlett-Packard? Nokia still leads the smartphone market with a 38 percent market share, according to Canalys, and RIM’s BlackBerry smartphones grew 41 percent in the second quarter. But the real battle for dominance seems to be brewing between Android and Apple.
Android’s Momentum
The iPhone continues to generate waves of interest worldwide, even with controversy swirling around the antenna on the iPhone 4. But Google’s Android operating system is rapidly expanding its market share.
In fact, Nielsen reports, Android’s meteoric rise has intensified in the last six months. Android moved past Apple’s iOS in the last quarter with 27 percent of the market.
“The Nielsen research is a data point and a moment in time,” said Michael Gartenberg, a partner at Altimeter Group. “It doesn’t factor in iPhone 4 sales and, of course, you have to consider that the iPhone in the U.S. is only available on one carrier. There are multiple Android devices on multiple carriers, and that tends to create some degree of imbalance.”
Apple’s Edge
For all the momentum Android is building, though, it seems Apple still has an edge. According to Nielsen, iPhone users are loyal to the device. Ninety percent…