Big news from Googel
Googles Android OS overtook the Apple iphone in US smartphone market share during the first quarter of 2010. Real Estate application developers should take note. Many real estate technology providers have been quick to lead with iPhone apps, but have lagged in support for the Android or Blackberry. This is not universally true – for example, GE led with their support for Palm, followed by Blackberry. GE Announced this week that eKey support for iPhone.
According to the NPD Group, Google now enjoys 28 percent of the smartphone market, earning the company the second-place spot behind Research in Motion (36 percent) and pushing Apple to third place (21 percent). NPD asserts Androids success to carrier promotions, such as Verizons buy-one-get-one-free offer on RIM and Android OS devices. AT&T remained on top of the smartphone carrier market with 32% market share. Verizon was close behind with 30%, while T-Mobile and Sprint both ended the quarter hovering near the 15 percent mark. It appears that companies with strong product marketing efforts will be able to assert ample pressure on Apple to continue to be competitive.
Apple may always trail in terms of market share. Under Steve Jobs, Apple has not been willing to license its OS out to third parties, and that’s the exact strategy that Google has used with Android to vault it to the top spot. On top of that, Apple currently limits the iPhone to one carrier (AT&T) while Android devices are carried by several different providers. AT&T has suffered a horrible reputation for the quality of data and voice connectivity on the iphone. This issues combine to give Google and Android a position on quality of core mobile services. Even when or if Apple finally moves to a multiple carrier model, Android will continue to be available on a wide variety of phones at a wide variety of price points, while iPhone OS will only be on a select number.
