The holiday season is upon us and its time to send in your wish list to Santa. The Droid Smart Phone is an ideal gift suggestion that’s bound to please the Web professional in all of us.
Droid Smart Phone Support Google
Droid is the first handset to sport the latest version of the Google (NasdaqGS:GOOG – News)-backed Android operating system, version 2.0. It costs $200 after a $100 rebate, with a two-year Verizon Wireless service contract. Besides Verizon stores, the phone will be sold at Best Buy (NYSE:BBY – News), Wal-Mart (NYSE:WMT – News) and Costco (NasdaqGS:COST – News).
Avian Securities analyst Matthew Thornton estimates 800,000 Droid phones will be sold through Dec. 31. Sprint Nextel (NYSE:S – News)sold about 700,000 Palm (NasdaqGS:PALM – News) Pre handsets in the first three months of that smart phone’s release this summer, while Apple sold 1.1 million iPhones in its first three months, in 2007. “The Droid reviews have been overwhelmingly favorable,” Thornton said according to a news report in IBD last week.
Motorola (NYSE:MOT – News) needs a hit. Market tracker iSuppli says Motorola had a 5.4% share of the global market as of June 30, down from 22.5% three years ago.
“Droid is potentially a game changer for Motorola,” iSuppli analyst Tina Teng said in a statement.
Seven handset makers have licensed Android, including Samsung, LG Electronics, Sony Ericsson (NYSE:SNE – News) (NasdaqGS:ERIC – News) and HTC. Carriers providing service also include Sprint and T-Mobile.
Android’s share of the market for handset operating systems will rise to 9% in 2013 from 2.4% in the second quarter, forecasts iSuppli. Research firm Gartner, however, projects Android’s share will hit 14.5% by 2012, moving into second place behind only Nokia (NYSE:NOK – News)-led Symbian, surpassing Apple and Research In Motion’s (NasdaqGS:RIMM – News) BlackBerry. Android is open and free to all handset makers, while Apple and RIM keep a close hold on their operating systems.
Tim McLaughlin, president and founder of Siteworx, a Web site and application developer for computer and mobile platforms, has yet a different outlook. He says the smart-phone market will become a two-horse race between the iPhone and Android phones, with Android winning. “In the long run, Android will prevail,” he said. “Droid represents the first real competitor to iPhone.” according to last weeks IBD.
There’s a comparison with the PC and Mac battle, he says. The Microsoft Windows/Intel platform was essentially open and accumulated 90% of the market. Apple kept a close hold on its Macintosh platform, which gave it a much smaller — albeit loyal — following.
“Unless Apple changes its business model, the Android will prevail,” McLaughlin said according to the IBD.