U.S. Smartphone Buyers Prefer Palm OS

[Ed Hardy]

Although the Symbian OS is the most popular smartphone operating system in Europe, most smartphones sold in the U.S. run the Palm OS.

Read more at http://www.brighthand.com/article/US...ite=SmartPhone

[ktdan1]

Are We forgetting that the MS Smart Phone was not even avaible on a large scale last year. So It really looks like MS smart phone has captured over 8% of the market in less than a year. I think that is realy good new. If they could just get the price down

They reports are all spin

[gfunkmagic]

Sheesh give the spinning a rest..

The problem with PalmSource and the mobile phone market is that they hardly have any gsm models to begin with! All the really have is the ancient TW and GSM Treo600 in Europe. Samsung has yet to release any GSM models... IMO, Palmsource desperately needs another big name mobile OEM as a lisencee to compete against Nokia, Moto etc... (Yes they have GSL etc but they still need a big OEM) Otherwise, their current marketshare even in NA will only be momentary...

[PlasticMan]

Originally posted by ktdan1
Are We forgetting that the MS Smart Phone was not even avaible on a large scale last year. So It really looks like MS smart phone has captured over 8% of the market in less than a year. I think that is realy good new. If they could just get the price down

They reports are all spin

treo 600 came out last fall, too, the same time as ms smartphones. clearly it has done much better in the same amount of time.

[ktdan1]

Originally posted by PlasticMan
treo 600 came out last fall, too, the same time as ms smartphones. clearly it has done much better in the same amount of time.

I don't believe the report states all of Palm\Handspring sales were under the 600 series. It is a combined number\percent. As far as carriers picking up the MS smart phones, the major carriers in the US were\are slow out of the gate.

So comparing the one MS smart Phone to all of the Palm\Handspring devices is alittle miss leading. The public is just now starting to see these devices (MS smart phone) from the major carriers.

Lets look at the numbers in about 2 years and review preferences but if the prices don't come down these devices will never move past the nich markets.

[k2stingray]

Have to admit that for last two years I was quite unimpressed with smart phone concepts. For the most part I thougt these were PDA like & size/shaped devices with cell phone functions added on.

Recently I saw features planned for the Motorola MPx220 smart phone.

If it performs basic cell phone functions well (i.e., good RF reception, clear sounding calls, etc.) and adds small memory card slot, BT for tethering to laptop or PPC and EDGE data speeds in a clamshell form factor that fits in your pocket then I'm going to be changing my opinion and jumping on the smart phone bandwagon soon. Would not use this to completely replace PPC, but would love to be able to use this in place of carrying around PPC or as a compliment to a PPC when prudent to do so.

Note that I'm not locked into Motoroala, if other reputable manufacturer provides such features I'd consider that as well. Right now it's very hard to find clamshell phone with just BT, speaker phone and fast data rate speeds - that is sold by US carrier.

[fmcpherson]

I wonder, do people buy Smartphones for the operating system or the hardware? The title suggests that buyers prefer Palm OS, when I would think that buyers really prefer the handsets themselves. The Treo 600 is very popular, what if instead of the Palm OS it ran Phone Edition or Smartphone, would it have the same sales? I think it may because the handset is very compelling.

[gfunkmagic]

Originally posted by fmcpherson
I wonder, do people buy Smartphones for the operating system or the hardware? The title suggests that buyers prefer Palm OS, when I would think that buyers really prefer the handsets themselves. The Treo 600 is very popular, what if instead of the Palm OS it ran Phone Edition or Smartphone, would it have the same sales? I think it may because the handset is very compelling.

It's actually both the hardware and software and how well it is integrated in the handset. The Treo600 definitely does not have the best hardware out there, far from it. But the raves it collected came from the way Handspring was able to successfully integrate the features into the device: one handed operation, 5-way nav, thumbboard, phone integration etc... You bascially need both and that is why I'm very curious to see if Benq can pull off something similar with its P50 device. It has all the hardware specs, but can they design and integrate the functionality well?

[Nate]

A different article here at BH says that RIM accounts for almost 15% of all handheld sales in the PDA category, which has got to be more than any treo or MS phone. Most of their units for consumer markets now have cellular built in, but there is no mention of them in the sales figures for smart phones. Just curious: do they rank in there with the group and just weren't counted? Or are their sales of cell-enabled blackberrys just not taking off?

[Ed Hardy]

Whether BlackBerries are considered smartphones or wireless handhelds depends on who you ask. IDC says they are smartphones while Garner says they are wireless handhelds. Looks like NPD Group classifies them as wireless handhelds, and therefore did not include them in these figures.

The reason Todd Kort at Gartner gives for classifying BlackBerries as wireless handheld is, according to him, most BlackBerry users also have a mobile phone and rarely use the voice capabilities of their BlackBerry.