Nokia was seen as the top Smartphone Vendor Matrix in a study released by ABI Research. Motorola and RIM (Research in Motion) have been placed on the following two places, in the ranking of worldwide smartphone vendors.

It is quite surprising to see Nokia and even Motorola manage to surpass RIM, the only smartphone producer of the BlackBerry phones. This situation is the result of the type of study that the ABI Research company has conducted. The title has been awarded not only on account of the number of such devices sold by Nokia, but coming from quality and market perception values.

"Nokia leads the global smartphone market, enjoying a market share of over 56% share in 2006. Nokia's strength also ensures the leading position of Symbian in the mobile OS market. Motorola, RIM, and Sony Ericsson match Nokia in terms of product innovation, but lag behind with respect to implementation, for example on parameters such as total shipments, and extensive distribution networks", explains industry analyst Shailendra Pandey.

This ranking is not valid for the US market, however. "In North America, Nokia trails Palm and RIM which together hold more than two-thirds of the market through their sales of Treo and BlackBerry devices", further observes industry analyst Shailendra Pandey.

It is only natural for things to stand this way in the US. Nokia is currently the leading global mobile phone producer, but has failed in reaching high results in the US. The Finnish producer holds only a small percentage from the American handset market, with little chances of expansion. This being the case, its smartphone line of devices has also managed to reach only a small number of phone users.

ABI Research has evaluated smartphone producers on the basis of Innovation and Implementation by selecting multiple criteria related to the product's features. The study has taken into consideration values regarding device shipments, brand equity, choice of OS, number of smartphone models, whether the vendor was first to market, distribution network, smartphone market share, smartphone ASP, operator relationships, ODM partnerships, manufacturing facilities, overall handset ASP and overall handset market share.

ABI Research has also taken into consideration the user interface customization, patent portfolio, handset differentiation, battery life, handset size, support for third party application developers, common and concise API and OS source code licenses. The evaluated products have received scores in each of these categories, allowing researchers to sum up these characteristics and provide an objective result.