Canalys: Symbian represents 33% of the market, Android 25%

According to the research group Canalys, Symbian now only represents 33% of global Smartphone OS market, while Android climbed up to 25% market share during the third quarter of 2010.

During the third quarter of 2010, 80.9 million Smartphone’s were shipped, almost double the amount of last year (+95%), although research group Canalys reports that slight changes to various manufacturers market share have taken place.

Globally, Nokia remains the market leader with their Symbian OS, controlling 33% of the market while Apple only has 17%, moving in ahead of Research in Motion for the first time, whose BlackBerry has 15% share of the market.

Things are a little different for Android as the platform is supported by a large number of manufacturers. No one manufacturer generates enough volume to worry the three leading manufacturers, but together the OS now represents 25% of the global market, with almost 20 million handsets, whereas last year at the same time they had shipped only 1.4 million.

Google’s OS has therefore managed to move in ahead of iOS and Blackberry Os, now placing it as the second most widely used Smartphone platform in the world, with a bright future still ahead of it for growth.


Android: more than 40% market share in the USA
In the US market, Android has taken a great lead in the Smartphone platform market, controlling 43.6%, while Apple iOS controls 26.2%, while Research in Motion has 24.2% with BlackBerry OS 6. Far behind is Microsoft with Windows Mobile (not yet Windows Phone which will be launched this month in the USA), which controls 3% while Symbian is almost non-existent.

The pairing of Nokia and Symbian is dominant everywhere else, especially in emerging markets where entry level and middle of the range Smartphone’s have good sales. This range doesn’t generate good profit margins though, with the Finnish group continuing to look to the top of the range to strengthen their advantage. Perhaps with MeeGo things will start to move for them.

As for Microsoft, everything will depend on how the Windows Phone 7 is received. Microsoft should quickly improve their market share, but will still have to try and differentiate themselves from their competition while also trying to seduce Asian consumers so as to generate sales volumes.