14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft’s Windows Phone operating system is grabbing more ground on the smartphone market, even if it does so at a very slow pace.
According to a recent report from IDC, the mobile platform is currently the second most popular OS in Taiwan, trailing only Google’s Android OS.
However, the actual market share it enjoys in the country is not encouraging at all. During the second quarter of the year, Windows Phone was loaded on only 2 percent of the smartphones in Taiwan, IDC’s report unveils, according to techinasia.
Android has managed to grab 97 percent of the market in this country, which leaves platforms such as Apple iOS and BlackBerry with less than 1 percent market share each.
2.1 million mobile phones were sold in Taiwan in Q2 2013, 1.7 million of which were smartphones, accounting for 80 percent of the overall shipments, IDC said.
As WMPoweruser notes, the main reason for which Windows Phone and other platforms performed poorly in Taiwan during said timeframe was the lack of large smartphones powered by them.
37 percent of the handsets sold in Taiwan in the three-month period packed screens larger than 5 inches, it seems.
Sales of large smartphones in this market increased by 13 percent in Q2 when compared to the first quarter of the year. 93 percent of the handsets sold in the country in the timeframe had screens larger than 4 inches.
Apparently, said trend is specific to the Taiwanese market, as mobile phones featuring 5-inch or larger screens accounted for only 18 percent of sales worldwide in the second quarter of the year.
Soon, Windows Phone might start gaining some more ground in this market, should the rumors on Nokia Lumia 1520 (expected to arrive in October with a 6-inch screen) pan out.
What remains to be seen, however, is whether Microsoft’s platform will manage to hurt sales of Android devices in Taiwan, considering the impressive amount of smartphones being sold there with Google’s OS loaded on top.