IDC Projects Windows Phone to Top iPhone in Market Share by 2015

[retroactiv]

I'm pretty sure he was referring to cut and paste in finder and "windows snap" is where you can snap two windows side by side easily- it is a great feature in W7 and I hope Apple incorporate it in some way.

Exactly. Apple needs to implement both of those features. They are not dealbreakers, but the make the experience more complete.

I use Hyperdock to enable the "window snap"... great app. And another app to allow files to be copy-pasted... can't remember the name of it though... available in Mac App Store.

 

[gnasher729]

IDC seems to assume that anyone who would have walked into a store and bought a Nokia smartphone (with Symbian) will now walk into the store and still buy a Nokia smartphone (with WP7 this time).

"Smartphones" covers a huge range of different phones. iOS and Android cover the higher end, Symbian covered the lower end. In the future, building the hardware for a "smartphone" instead of a dumb phone will become cheaper; as a result, many people not interested in the capabilities of a smartphone at all will buy one by default; that will make the smartphone market grow. That is also what makes Apple's iPhone market share shrink: Apple's sales are growing, the market share among _all_ phones is growing, but because the percentage of smart phones among all phones is growing from say 20% to 90%, the market share among smart phones is going down.

But why would a former Nokia customer buy WP7? IDC assumes this will happen by default; they bought Nokia before, they bought Nokia again. But Nokia doesn't have the same product anymore. If the customer can't get something similar to what they had before, they are free to look _anywhere_. And WP7 can't beat Android on price (because of the license fees fees Nokia has to pay to Microsoft), and WP7 can't beat iOS on quality. I can't see any former Nokia customer deciding that a Nokia WP7 phone will be the best they can get for their money.

Seems believable...all those people that bought Nokia phones obviously did not care that Symbian was outdated. Why will they not buy Nokia with a much modern OS under the hood?

At some point Nokia had the best phones; then they messed it all up. People kept buying Nokia phones in shrinking numbers because they remembered Nokia's good reputation. That reputation is now gone. And there is still a bit of desert ahead of Nokia until they have WP7 phones for sale; that isn't going to help.

 

[zep1977]

Apple should just shut down and give the money back to the shareholders.

 

[yellowballoon]

Apple still doesn't have upload to a cloud or wireless syncing, and Windows Phone does. 25 GB free sky drive, as well as a beautiful hub where you choose what to access at a glance. In iOS, you have to flick and flick, especially if you have many apps. The wireless syncing is slick. Facebook integration flawless. WP7 also now has cut, copy, and paste and HTML5 before the end of the year. I'm sorry, but hooking up with the largest mobile phone manufacture is a no brainer.

 

[Nebrie]

Cmd+Drag moves a file which is enough to replace cutting a file for me.

 

[ChazUK]

In iOS, you have to flick and flick, especially if you have many apps.

There's always that little thing called "Spotlight". Home button, flick left, start typing.

Hardly an impossibility.

 

[iScott428]

Snap and Cut Copy Paste

Although SL does not have a stupid name like snap for being able to put windows side by side, we have been able to do it for years and it is one of my favorite features of OS, and what a concept allowing me to move a window where ever I want it and scroll through the page even if it is not active. All of you W7 humpers please try and "snap" two excel or word files next to each other. Oh that right you cant, because heaven forbid I would want to do that and work simultaneous on two MS office files.

Not sure why people are complaining about the Cut feature either, dragging works great and and so does Cmd+x;c;v, respectively.

 

[max pl]

It would be more interesting to see their PROFIT SHARE predictions.

yes profit is so, so important for us consumers.

 

[jp102235]

Windows 7 kicks ass, it's every bit as good as Snow Leopard if not better.

I especially like the x11 server integration that windows 7 has.... oh wait...

let's not get into blanket-statement flame wars here. For _some_ people W7 is great, for others, not so much. those of us that use the unix/x11 component of SnowLeopord really love it and miss it on W7.

 

[firewood]

It's actually a trap for Nokia. Nokia gets a substantial portion of its market share from selling low priced phones. People who buy cheap phones don't have as much money to buy apps. App developers who want to make money will develop apps for people with money who buy the more expensive (higher profit margin) smartphones. Then customers who want a rich app environment won't buy the cheap phones because they won't have as many new cool apps. They'll buy iPhones. It's a viscous circle. Apple doesn't need market share to keep printing money (and investing it in R&D and marketing for new cool products).

 

[cube]

Seems believable...all those people that bought Nokia phones obviously did not care that Symbian was outdated. Why will they not buy Nokia with a much modern OS under the hood?

I bought a Symbian Nokia because I wanted a cheap 3G phone which was open and with an acceptable OS.

Obviously, that's going to be my first and last Nokia now.

I want a phone with real Java, so my most likely candidate next time is QNX, if RIM makes a good inexpensive smartphone.

 

[jp102235]

Apple still doesn't have upload to a cloud or wireless syncing, and Windows Phone does. 25 GB free sky drive, as well as a beautiful hub where you choose what to access at a glance.

mobile me does this, and I suspect, it will become free soon (or at least parts of it).

 

[OptyCT]

Exactly. Apple needs to implement both of those features. They are not dealbreakers, but the make the experience more complete.

I use Hyperdock to enable the "window snap"... great app. And another app to allow files to be copy-pasted... can't remember the name of it though... available in Mac App Store.

BetterTouchTool also has a snap function. I use it all the time.

 

[DudeMartin]

Mac's are far from the top of the market share for computers... no one thinks any less of them?

 

[Vegasman]

All of you W7 humpers please try and "snap" two excel or word files next to each other. Oh that right you cant, because heaven forbid I would want to do that and work simultaneous on two MS office files.

Uh!?

 

[Tones2]

Over FOUR YEARS, which is a major amount of time in this market, I think iOS, Andriod and Windows phones with all be pretty much the same. I think there's going to be a point where that not more more to do with hardware in terms of innovative features. The OS's themselves are really just shells for running apps anyway, and they will all do this fairly effectively in similar ways, a lot like OSX and Win7 are two good OS's. The key will be the app market, which Apple currently holds a huge lead, but in 4 years it would seem that Android and Windows will catch up in terms of IMPORTANT apps to run, so that will be levelized as well.

The iPhone will always have the crazy fanboys to their advantage but Android and Windows phones have the flexibility factor of an open platform where a number of manufacturers can make phones at different price points in different markets.

So in 4 years, I think all will have similar market shares, with iOS being at the bottom of the three just in terms of number of phones because of the closed platform syndrome, but not by much. However, the iPhone will be the most profitable of the three for the OS manufacturers since Apple also maks the hardware.

So let's call it a tie - everybody wins, including the consumer. Remember fanboys - competition and choice is a GOOD thing!

Tony

 

[MuDPHuDStudent]

More people buy smartphones. So Apple could sell more iPhones and have a lower market share.

Looks like they predict a 20% year on year growth for smartphones, which is quite high!

Oh, okay, got it. Thanks! For some reason I thought they were talking about growth rate in market share and not in total sales.

 

[jackaninny]

Looks to me like a combined MS/Nokia actually LOSES marketshare. (26.4% down to 21.1%) - funny how the 'report' doesn't spin the numbers that way. I do find it humorous that these analysts think they can see 2015 with any semblance of accuracy.

 

[iPadPublisher]

So What

You know I read these things all the time about how the Windows Phone OS is picking up steam or how many Android units there are out there... I'm not even sure anyone at Apple really cares about these numbers because we're talking about dozens of handsets using those OS's vs a single phone on iOS.

I guess the comparison is important to some people, but until Apple is also making nine different phones, the numbers will never stack up. So what.

 

[chameleon]

Look at me!

I'll make a crazy prediction and get a few minutes of fame...

... before being ridiculed for decades along with:

• Michael Dell - [Apple should] "shut it down and give the money back to the shareholders"
• Steve Ballmer - "There's no chance that the iPhone is going to get any significant market share. No chance."
• Charles H. Duell - "Everything that can be invented has been invented."

 

[elgrecomac]

I am not an angry Apple Fan-boy.

First let mes start by saying I use and like Microsoft products: Office 2011, Visio, MS Project and Windows 7 (under Fusion...the Vista they SHOULD HAVE released). I also have an Apple MPB, 30" Cinema display, iP4(jailbroken, of course), iP2, airport express and extreme and , if we include my wife's computer, a 27" iMac.

But when I see an article predicting MS will dominate the smartphone market in 3 years, well, I find it totally amusing given Apple and Android's overall adoption rate today and the the fact that Apple, more than any company on the planet, really understands the 'user experience'. People like the iPhone and iPad not only because Apple Marketing is extraordinary but also, the SOFTWARE is great and the App Store is not bad either. After 25+years of being force-fed a weak OS (Windows, Windows 95, XP and Vista) I am not one to bet the future on Microsoft's ability to write a great, wildly accepted OS on any platform.

 

[Hattig]

when closing an application in OS X is as easy as clicking an X in the top right corner let me know

Who cares about quitting applications these days?

Sure, closing windows (which is the Mac OS function for clicking on the window close button - whoa, difficult concept!) is required, but quitting apps is surely a far rarer thing, that shouldn't be accidentally invoked - hence it is behind a menu, or a keyboard shortcut. May I also point out that cmd+Q is a lot easier to type than alt+F4, and makes sense as an application level command?

But quitting apps? Why? We're not running on slow CPUs with limited RAM any more. Even our phones only quit applications upon operating system demand, and they cleverly suspend the application state to be restored upon restart. This is coming to Mac OS X Lion, and not before time. Quitting applications is the exception, not the rule.

 

[Tones2]

I do find it humorous that these analysts think they can see 2015 with any semblance of accuracy.

I find it also humorous the number of people in this forum who are positive that this WON'T happen, and don't think THAT is a prediction.

Tony

 

[darthcarto]

As someone who used a Samsung Focus for 5 long, painful months, only to switch back to my old 3GS this past weekend, I say: "Umm... NO!" I don't see that happening.

 

[Unspeaked]

But when I see an article predicting MS will dominate the smartphone market in 3 years, well, I find it totally amusing given Apple and Android's overall adoption rate today and the the fact that Apple, more than any company on the planet, really understands the 'user experience'. People like the iPhone and iPad not only because Apple Marketing is extraordinary but also, the SOFTWARE is great and the App Store is not bad either. After 25+years of being force-fed a weak OS (Windows, Windows 95, XP and Vista) I am not one to bet the future on Microsoft's ability to write a great, wildly accepted OS on any platform.

Someone else who didn't bother reading the article, or even looking at the pictures.

No one is saying Microsoft will dominate the smartphone market. IDC is saying Google will dominate the smartphone market. They just also think Microsoft will have passed Apple as the next largest player.