Mobile research and analysis
Figures on shipments of mobile devices
PalmOne has a firm grip on the US
Nokia has seen stunning growth - 230 per cent year on year - for the third quarter of 2004. PalmOne's Treo 600 Smartphone has been a smash hit in the US. While palmOne's shipments are up, however, its market share has fallen from 21.7 per cent to 14.5 per cent.
Hewlett-Packard - along with other hand-held makers - has seen modest growth overall. Worldwide growth was up by only four per cent, with a drop in shipments in the US of 16 per cent. The rest of the world saw an increase of eight per cent.
Symbian takes lion's share of the market
Symbian has really taken off this year, holding just over half of the market for mobile devices in the third quarter, up from just over 30 per cent. This has been reflected in sales by Symbian shareholder Nokia. Microsoft's market share appears to have slipped a little, from 27.9 per cent down to 20.2 per cent.
PalmSource's continuing decline may have added fuel to rumours recently that palmOne is considering dropping PalmSource's operating system, something strenuously denied by the hardware vendor.
Nokia knocks back opposition in EMEA
Meanwhile, Nokia holds on to its premier position in EMEA, thanks to its traditional dominance of the mobile phone market. Hewlett-Packard holds second place thanks to strong iPAQ sales.
Without the benefit of the Treo 600 - now being seeded into the channel in EMEA - palmOne looks a little sluggish compared to its US performance. The Treo 600 has been delayed by patchy and protracted deals with operators in individual territories and may also have been hit by the cultural preference of the region's users for mobile phones over PDAs.
Symbian is a smooth operator
As with the worldwide figures, Symbian leads the way over Microsoft in the operating system (OS) stakes in EMEA.
However, possibly due to the region's preference for mobile phones over hand-helds and its traditional bias in favour of domestic suppliers such as Nokia, the share for Symbian is huge: close to two-thirds of all devices shipped in the third quarter of 2004 were running the Symbian OS, while the total number of devices shipped has more than doubled.
To see the illustrations associated with this report please click here.