As hard as it may be to believe – and for someone like me, who has been covering mobility for well over 12 years it is really hard to believe – this week the cell phone celebrated its 40th birthday. It has now been a full 40 years since the first ever cell phone call was made. It’s the call that started it all for those of us immersed in today’s mobility. Back on April 3, 1973, Marty Cooper - then an engineer with Motorola - placed the first ever public call from a cell phone – you know, one of those monster bricks that back then were the height of high tech.
Of course back then there were no such things as mobile operating systems, Motorola wasn’t an entity that eventually became absorbed by Google, and there were no mobile OS wars going on. Today it’s a whole different kettle of fish, with every day there seemingly being yet another set of stats to tell us iOS or Android are now in the lead. In fact, Kantar Worldpanel has just released its own most recent survey numbers and as iOS and Android continue to rule, there also continues to be significant erosion of BlackBerry’s market, especially outside of the United States. Perhaps even more surprising it may be coming at the hands of Windows Phone.
And, a recent report from Gartner suggests that there are going to be a lot more electronic devices getting shipped out this year, but the sources of the aggregate number are about to change from the familiar, to the less familiar. Looking at Gartner's recent numbers suggests nothing less than a full sea change in terms of where many users will be turning for communications needs over the next year. The Gartner report notes that on a combined basis shipments of PCs, tablets, and mobile phones will add up to a total of 2.9 billion units in 2017. But it's the mix of devices that proves especially noteworthy, as PCs will continue to fall in favor of tablets, smartphones, and ultra-mobile devices.
Not to be outdone by Gartner, Visiongain, a British research company, has released a new report that looks at the global tablet market. The main focus of the report is on Apple and how rival tablet companies are devising strategies in an attempt to steal the market share from them. However it plays out the report predicts that the tablet market will account for $53.6 billion in revenue in 2013 – a huge uptick.
And not to be outdone by Gartner or Visiongain, ABI Research has a new report out forecasts the mobile security services market to hit $1.88 billion by the end of the year. This takes into account the majority of both the mobile device and mobile application security markets. Clearly security is a hot topic in the enterprise these days.
Keeping with our research and survey theme this week, there is another very interesting report out. Before we get into it though we want to point out that we have long suggested that the very large smartphone approach to handsets is not going to survive – that Samsung’s large display devices are not the future. In fact we believe it’s nothing more than a fad. And as if right on cue, Flurry recently released a new report which reveals which form factors are being used, which aren’t and which are likely to go the way of the dinosaur – or at least the way of BlackBerry devices. The verdict? The report claims that the phablet category – those devices approaching five inches in display size – of which the Samsung Galaxy Note 2 and the just introduced Galaxy S4 fall into – are exactly what we suggest they are…a fad. Go figure.
Finally, we’ll leave you with the comforting news that as those phablets of Samsung begin to disappear, the company itself will gain a very large presence in the United States consumer marketplace. How will it accomplish this? By opening stores within stores within Best Buy. Samsung and Best Buy have been holding some off the grid concept testing, and for the past couple of weeks Samsung has set up small Samsung Store areas within Best Buy in Dallas, Chicago and Minneapolis. Will they have an impact on Apple stores? Now there is a good laugh to leave you with as we head off into the weekend!
Have a great weekend.
QUICK LINKS 
