Ovum: 653 million smartphones by 2016

And 38 per cent of them will be Android.

The market watcher said smartphone shipments will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 14.5 per cent between 2010 and 2016.

Asia-Pacific will account for just over 200 million units, while Western Europe and North America will ship 175 million and 165 million respectively.

With Android in charge, the rest of the market will split fairly evenly across competing platforms: Apple will own 17.5 per cent, RIM 16.5 per cent and Nokia/Microsoft’s Windows Phone will grab 17.2 per cent.

Ovum principal analyst Adam Leach said: “The success of the Android platform is being driven by the sheer number of hardware vendors supporting it at both the high and low ends of the market.”

He added that there could be a wildcard entrant too. “We expect at least one other platform to achieve mainstream success within the forecast period.

"This could be an existing player in the market such as Bada, WebOS, or MeeGo, or it could be a new entrant to the market place.”

Add a new comment