Android a Monopoly?

[asherros]

The recent figures of Q3 2012 points towards something similar only. Almost 75% of Smartphones that were shipped in the last quarter run on Google's Android OS.

There were roughly 136 million Android devices shipped in the last quarter. This figure is almost twice the no. of devices shipped in the same period last year.

Considering the volume of Android run devices and the growth rate it will soon acquire a monopoly position in the market.

[Ben Stones]

Re: Android a Monopoly?

Well a lot more Android phones are sold simply because there are more hardware manufacturers producing Android phones at varying price points. While I personally wouldn't want to opt for an Android phone, it is a good platform but I just feel Android is just a fragmented mess and new phones are released way too soon with many handsets not receiving software upgrades that should really be given by the company that produced the phone.

I think I read last week (or during the weekend) that 50% of all Android smartphones that are tracked by Google (i.e. purchases made in the Google Play store and any activations going through Google servers) are using Android 2.3. Android 2.3 was released back in December 2010 - and 50% of devices are still using it. Comparing this on a similar basis with the iPhone, it's very likely that an iOS release in 2010 is not used by the majority of iOS devices that can be upgraded. Many Android phones that haven't been upgraded from version 2.3 can likely run newer versions of Android fine.

Nonetheless, Android is definitely a successful mobile platform but I still think compared to iOS and Windows Phone, it's more fragmented. I'd also be concerned about the kind of apps in the Google Play store.

Besides bashing, it's a good ecosystem nonetheless and there are a lot of people that like Android phones compared with others on the market - iPhone, Windows Phone, BlackBerry, etc.