Smartphone sales up in Q2 '08, BlackBerry leapfrogs Windows Mobile

Yo, Microsoft, step on the gas and get Windows Mobile 7 out the door, would ya? Gartner's profile of global smartphone sales in the second quarter of 2008 reveals that RIM's BlackBerry OS has jumped over Windows Mobile to become the number two platform finding its way into pockets around the world, while perennial powerhouse Symbian carries on comfortably with the number one spot (and it's not UIQ that's doing the heavy lifting there, if you catch our drift). As a percentage of the overall mobile market, smartphones account for the same 11 percent they did a year ago -- but the entire market saw growth, meaning that total smartphone shipments jumped a solid 15.7 percent over the same period. Well-earned kudos to RIM for knocking WinMo off its high horse, but seriously, Microsoft need only look in the mirror if it wants to know exactly how this came to pass.

[Via jkOnTheRun]

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 14th 2008 11:16PM]

230% growth? dam that feels good, go apple :)

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 14th 2008 11:36PM]

when you only sold 270k in the same quarter last year it's kinda hard to do anything but go up...especially since it's being sold in an additional 20 countries...

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 14th 2008 11:52PM]

i agree, apple does have a great product and therefor a need for a larger market

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 15th 2008 7:27AM]

I wonder if these numbers will make the US readers on this site understand how little love there is for WinMo out there. Or at least outside that strange American market, because that´s what it is.

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 15th 2008 7:53AM]

You speak for yourself, not the market outside the american market.

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 15th 2008 9:27AM]

Indeed, I've noticed In Hong Kong, a huge percentage of the handsets are Windows Mobile.

[Step666 Posted Sep 15th 2008 10:29AM]

"...but seriously, Microsoft need only look in the mirror if it wants to know exactly how this came to pass."

That seems a bit unfair, not to mention misleading.
For a start, since it isn't MS who produce the hardware, so they are limited somewhat by those who do - if the hardware manufacturers don't produce anything that people want, then of course the OS's market-share is going to drop and that's really no fault of MS, is it? You could have the greatest OS in the world, if no-one makes anything that runs it, you won't have a market-share.

Also, the figures are for Q2, so before any of the recent releases like the Touch Pro and the Omnia, before the up-coming X1, the just-announced Touch HD, the rumoured Asus 'Galaxy7' or whatever it's called. Even the Touch Diamond was only released in May and, therefore will have had little-to-no market impact during the period these figures cover.
So, the sizeable drop in WM sales could be little more than people holding off for the slew of much-nicer-looking devices that were on the horizon, as opposed to any migration away from the OS as a whole.

I'm not saying it wouldn't be nice if they'd just hurry up and get WM7 out already, I'm just saying that you're being a bit presumptive to declare WM6/6.1 as being dead in the water.

[(Unverified) Posted Sep 15th 2008 10:40AM]

windows mobile is a piece of crap. Now that there are more mobile OSes to choose from it totally looks like
a relic.