The big picture
A couple more surveys are shedding light on the relative popularity of the major mobile platforms.
Ironically-named UK outfit Yankee Group has previewed some findings from its 2011 European mobile user study, which polled thousands of users in Western Europe. 40 percent of those polled, who were intending to buy a smartphone, will go for an iPhone. This makes the iPhone twice a s popular as any of the others, with Android coming in at 19 percent, BlackBerry 17 percent and Nokia 15 percent.
"These findings highlight the continued strength of Apple in the European smartphone market and, in particular, its phenomenal brand appeal," said Declan Lonergan, research VP at Yankee Group. "The data also highlights the enormous challenges faced by Nokia and RIM to retain mind share and market share in this increasingly dynamic and competitive marketplace."
The study also found that employees are increasingly using their own computing devices for work, with the explicit approval of IT departments, people feel more productive on the road with tablets, and that most have multiple devices.
Another study, this time from comScore, sheds some light on which devices are used to access the Internet in which countries. The table below shows the proportion of non-PC Internet traffic generated per device in several countries.
It's interesting to note what a large proportion of traffic is already generated by tablets, which is far in excess of their relative installed-base. It's also clear that Android's success owes more to the US, Japan and Argentina than it does Europe.
|
Share of Non-Computer Device Traffic for Selected Countries |
|||||||||
|
Tablets |
Mobile Phones |
Other Devices |
|||||||
|
iPad |
Android |
Other Tablet |
iPhone |
Android |
Other Smart- phone |
Feature Phone |
iPod Touch |
Other |
|
|
Canada |
33.5% |
0.4% |
1.3% |
34.6% |
8.2% |
3.6% |
1.5% |
14.9% |
2.0% |
|
Brazil |
31.8% |
1.6% |
0.0% |
21.0% |
11.7% |
11.3% |
17.3% |
4.1% |
1.1% |
|
Germany |
29.4% |
0.9% |
0.0% |
35.1% |
16.2% |
4.6% |
2.8% |
8.3% |
2.5% |
|
Spain |
27.4% |
0.8% |
0.0% |
34.2% |
22.1% |
7.2% |
2.7% |
3.6% |
1.9% |
|
France |
26.9% |
0.6% |
0.0% |
34.3% |
17.1% |
5.7% |
5.5% |
3.9% |
6.0% |
|
Singapore |
26.2% |
1.4% |
0.1% |
51.9% |
10.0% |
3.9% |
1.5% |
4.8% |
0.2% |
|
Australia |
25.9% |
0.5% |
0.0% |
50.0% |
10.5% |
3.8% |
1.8% |
7.1% |
0.4% |
|
U.S. |
21.8% |
0.6% |
0.1% |
23.5% |
35.6% |
6.7% |
2.4% |
7.8% |
1.5% |
|
UK |
21.3% |
0.3% |
0.0% |
29.9% |
15.1% |
15.0% |
8.2% |
8.7% |
1.5% |
|
Chile |
12.9% |
0.6% |
0.0% |
45.2% |
13.9% |
11.6% |
9.1% |
6.0% |
0.7% |
|
Argentina |
12.4% |
0.4% |
0.0% |
12.5% |
23.2% |
16.8% |
27.5% |
6.7% |
0.5% |
|
Japan |
11.3% |
0.0% |
0.0% |
49.5% |
30.6% |
0.2% |
2.6% |
4.7% |
1.1% |
|
India |
4.0% |
0.5% |
0.0% |
2.8% |
6.0% |
14.1% |
71.9% |
0.6% |
0.0% |
Within Europe the UK has by far the highest proportion of Internet traffic derived from non-PCs as 5.3 percent, with Spain next at 2.3 percent. We're less into our tablets than the rest of Europe, though, as shown in the table below.
|
Share of Non-Computer Device Traffic by Device Type for Select European Countries |
||||
|
|
Country |
|||
|
Device Type |
France |
Germany |
Spain |
UK |
|
Mobile |
62.5% |
58.8% |
66.2% |
68.1% |
|
Tablet |
27.6% |
30.3% |
28.3% |
21.7% |
|
Other |
9.9% |
10.9% |
5.5% |
10.2% |
|
Handheld Device |
4.4% |
8.5% |
3.8% |
8.8% |
|
Gaming Console |
5.5% |
2.3% |
1.7% |
1.4% |
