NEW DELHI: India is an Android country. According to IDC, Google’s mobile operating system has a 91% market share in the country, giving it an overwhelming lead over its competitors.
The second most used mobile OS in the country is Windows Phone, which has a market share of 5.4%. The figures from IDC, which tracks units of phones shipped in a market, are for the second quarter of this year.
Apple’s iOS, which powers iPhones, has a market share of just 2.3%.
It was expected that Apple, which has a very low market share outside the US, would release a low-cost iPhone to take on cheap Android and Windows Phone devices. However, iPhone 5C, which was rumoured to be the cheap iPhone, turned out to be a premium phone with a price of around $549 for the entry-level model. The device is expected to cost around Rs 40,000 in India.
On Thursday, Apple CEO Tim Cook told Business Week magazine that Apple was not interested in selling “junk.”
“There’s always a large junk part of the market. We’re not in the junk business,” Cook said. “I’m not going to lose sleep over that other market, because it’s just not who we are.”
“Android totally dominates the market because it is used by all major smartphone players in India. Local vendors like Micromax and Karbonn have adopted it. Chinese players like Huawei and ZTE are pushing it and MNCs like Samsung and Sony are using it for their smartphones,” said Manasi Yadav, senior market analyst with IDC.
“Android powers phones costing Rs 3,000 to Rs 45,000 and that helps it attract a lot of consumers,” added Manasi.
Apart from the wide adoption by phone companies, Android has also been helped by the demise of Symbian operating system, which was earlier used by Nokia. After Nokia partnered with Microsoft for Windows Phone it decided to stop making Symbian-based phones. Manasi said the first quarter of this year was the last time her research firm tracked shipment of Symbian phones.
In the absence of any other viable low-cost smartphone OS, Android has seen its popularity surge. In 2010, Symbian had over 40% share in India’s smartphone market.
Manasi said that Windows Phone was doing well but it required more time. “Windows Phone is steadily growing in India. It is doing good, though the market share is still very low. But we need to give it more time. It is not fair to compare it to Android, which has been around for a longer duration,” she said.
Vineet Durani, director (Windows Phone business group) at Microsoft India said, “Less than ten months back, when we launched Windows Phone 8 in India, we had set ourselves the goal of being the second most widely used smartphone platform in India, and we are excited to have achieved this milestone so quickly.”
According to IDC, Android holds 79.3% share in global smartphone market. Apple’s iOS is second with 13.2% while Windows Phone is third with 3.7% share.
source : Times of India
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