Back-to-School Shopping Success — for Smartphones
courtesy of SamsungDuring the third calendar quarter this year 11% of mobile phone subscribers decided to replace or upgrade their phones. Of that number, nearly 80% chose a smartphone. According to research from Nielsen, smartphone penetration in the U.S. rose…
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During the third calendar quarter this year 11% of mobile phone subscribers decided to replace or upgrade their phones. Of that number, nearly 80% chose a smartphone.
According to research from Nielsen, smartphone penetration in the U.S. rose from 62% in the second quarter to 64.7% in the third quarter and 70% of teenagers (13-17) and 79% of young adults (18-24) now own smartphones.
Measured by market share, the top manufacturer in the third quarter was Apple Inc. (NASDAQ: AAPL) with a 41% share followed by Samsung Electronics with a 26.3% share, which includes 0.3% sales of Windows Phone. HTC Corp. was in third place with 8.5% and Motorola, owned by Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) was fourth with 8%.
On the operating system side of the equation, Android from Google posted market share of 52% followed by Apple with 41%, Blackberry Ltd. (NASDAQ: BBRY) with 3%, and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) with 2%.
The following chart from Nielsen shows manufacturer market share by operating system:
Nielsen notes that with the U.S. market so well stocked with smartphones, the remaining non-adopters might need an extra push to replace their feature phones. Some clever marketing is likely to be needed to attract new buyers without alienating those who already have a smartphone.
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Paul Ausick has been writing for 247Wallst.com for more than a decade. He has written extensively on investing in the energy, defense, and technology sectors. In a previous life, he wrote technical documentation and managed a marketing communications group in Silicon Valley.
He has a bachelor's degree in English from the University of Chicago and now lives in Montana, where he fishes for trout in the summer and stays inside during the winter.