Google's Android OS continues to dominate the U.S. smartphone market, but Motorola's influence as an Android customer has decreased, according to a Monday study.
Overall, Android has a commanding share of the market: sales rose to 52 percent of all units sold during the second quarter, according to NPD. Apple's iPhone achieved a "slight quarterly gain" to 29 percent, placing it well behind Android, the firm found.
Beyond that, more minor players like the RIM BlackBerry OS achieved an 11 percent market share, while the Windows Phone 7, Windows Mobile and HP's WebOS trailed far behind at under 5 percent apiece. NPD's numbers track consumer purchases within the United States, and do not include phone purchases made by enterprises or corporations.
Although NPD tracks end-point purchases, and other surveys, like Nielsen, are based on surveys, the combination shows that Google's Android still is generating sales. In July, Nielsen found that Android now has the largest share of the U.S. smartphone market with 39 percent, followed by Apple and iOS with 28 percent. Research in Motion's BlackBerry, meanwhile, fell down to 20 percent.
NPD also found that Motorola Mobility's influence in the Android segment considerably waned. Motorola, which was the target of a $12.5 billion acquisition last week, saw its share of the Android market drop from 44 percent in the second quarter of 2010 to 22 percent in the second quarter of 2011. Samsung and LG both picked up significant gains, as Android's share among different OEMs began to fragment.
Overall, Motorola's share declined by 3 percentage points from the same period last year, to 9 percent. In smartphones, Motorola's share dipped from 15 percent to 12 percent.
"Google's acquisition of Motorola shifts the balance of power in the handset-patent conflict between Google and its operating system competitors," said Ross Rubin, executive director of industry analysis for NPD, in a statement. "Android's momentum has made for a large pie that is attractive to Motorola's Android rivals, even if they must compete with their operating system developer."
NPD also tracked the rise of smartphones on prepaid plans, which jumped to 22 percent of the prepaid market.
"Android is also leading the charge in the rapidly growing prepaid smartphone market," Rubin added. "This was once a key segment for Motorola that the company has an opportunity to reclaim as prepaid carriers build their smartphone portfolios."
Source:http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2391575,00.asp?kc=PCRSS05039TX1K0000762
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