The smartphone market grew 56.7% in Q1 this year, against increases of 21.7% for the mobile market overall. So, who’s buying, and which platform?
According to comScore, smartphone subscription in the UK increased by 70% for the previous four quarters, whilst the Italian market softened with only 11% growth. Despite this stagnation in subscriptions, the Italians still lead smartphone penetration in Europe (32% of mobile devices are smartphones), compared to the UK at 23%. The Spanish rank second, and the Germans and French rank 4th and 5th of the big five EU countries.
The entrance of more low-to-mid priced smartphone devices has been the main driver behind this growth. The Symbian platform (mainly from Nokia and Sony Ericsson) holds the marketshare in all five countries and dominates in Germany, Spain and Italy. However, competition from iPhone is growing in both the UK and France, plus Research in Motion (RIM), the manufacturer of Blackberry, is gaining favor in the UK and Microsoft (Motorola, Samsung, HTC) in France. In contrast, Symbian uptake is negligible in the US with RIM attempting to hold onto its lead against iPhone and Microsoft.
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