It was always going to happen eventually. Android has grown at an exponential rate and it was only matter a of time. In the 12 weeks up to August 7, Android handsets accounted for more then 42% of smartphone purchases, with the iPhone hitting just over 37%, the likes of Symbian, BlackBerry and Windows Phone 7 making up the rest. This is good news, but the question is how long will it stay like that? Yes Android is on hundreds of different handsets by a assortment of different manufacturers, Samsung, HTC, Motorola, LG, Sony Ericsson, Huawei, ZTE, the list goes on, not to mention the no-name Chinese manufacturers and imports. Android is growing big time and will continue, however, there is a angry beast lurking who would like it’s top spot back – Apple, and next quarter seems to be where the battle is likely to happen.
Apple are poised and rumoured to be announcing and releasing the iPhone 5 in a month or two, and when a company that makes one handset a year, and up until now has dominated the smartphone market in Australia, they can certainly rally their troops and turn on that massive marketing and hype building machine they have and try and gain back that coveted number 1 spot. With the amount of handsets being produced by an every growing list of manufactures, it will not be long before no company or device or OS will be able to catch Android. That is the beast of the mobile world that is Android, much like Windows is the beast of the desktop world, it was licensed and it took off. Let’s hope it stays that way.
