14 DAY TRIAL // Symbian's growing trend has been recently confirmed by several market studies, but the release of the Windows Mobile 5.0 operating system could dramatically change things.
Shipping of cell phones including the Symbian operating system has generated 6.75 million units sold in the first quarter of this year, setting a new sale increase record: 180%.
The overall performance obtained by Symbian since it has been launched on the market of mobile devices amounts to 32 million sold cell phones, and 48 new cell phones, including producers like: BenQ, Fujitsu, Mitsubishi, Motorola, Nokia, Panasonic, Sendo, Siemens and Sony Ericsson have recently been shipped towards 200 operators.
Among the 48 new models of Symbian OS telephones distributed at the end of first quarter, 12 of them will be taken by operators from Japan, Europe and will be used in the 3G telephony networks.
In February, Symbian released Symbian OS v9, which focused on security and enterprise applications. This version was aimed at the middle-end market, accompanying phones offered by operators in promotional packages.
If until recently, Microsoft didn't quite have the means to threaten Symbian's leading position, once the company launched Windows Mobile 5.0, Redmond's market share could greatly increase. Currently, Microsoft's mobile solutions grabbed 18.5% of the market, and PalmSource has only 10.5 percents. According to the adoption rate of the new system, Microsoft could take a slice out of Symbian's share.