The latest research report from In-Stat says the current ‘Operating System wars’ are likely to end within the next few years as consumers stop choosing smartphones based on OS and start looking at device functionality instead.
It says the Symbian operating system will continue to dominate over the next few years but competition will cause a drop in net Symbian-based smartphone shipments in 2014. In-Stat analyst Allen Nogee anticipates 2010 being “the year of Android”, adding that Maemo devices will also eat into Symbian’s market share.
The company adds that the total smartphone market in 2014 will be 412 million units. Year-on-year shipments of smartphones with touch screens will more than double in 2009, while shipments of smartphones with accelerometers will grow to over 350 million units (85% of the market) by 2014.