The report was released by Kantar World Panel and studied the above mentioned countries in addition to the United States and Australia. According to Kantar, the company is the world leader in consumer knowledge and insights based on continuous consumer panels. Its High Definition Inspiration™ approach combines market monitoring, advanced analytics and tailored market research solutions to deliver both the big picture and the fine detail that inspire successful actions by its clients.
According to the report, over a 12 month period, Spain had the highest percentage of Android smartphone consumers at 84.1% of market share. Italy has the lowest Android market share at 49.6%. As it pertains to market share, the other surveyed European countries fell in-between Spain and Italy: Germany – 68.5%; France - 58.8%; and Great Britain – 57.2%.
“We are seeing much of the Android sales growth being driven by consumers trading up from feature phones to smartphones. Android handsets currently offer an easier platform to enable these consumers to upgrade, as many first time smartphone consumers state ‘price of handset’ and ‘multimedia capabilities’ as their main reason for choosing an Android device. Our data shows that Android has a higher share of those consumers spending under £50 on buying their handset across the vast majority of countries we cover.
- Dominic Sunnebo, Consumer Insight Director for Kantar World Panel
Kantar noticed several trends including respondents were trading up from a basic mobile phone to a smartphone. Also, according to their data Android is wooing away 1st time users who would traditionally be RIM’s customers. Finally in the UK, Kantar noticed an increase in prepay users.
The report also pointed to owner loyalty as a helpful advantage for Google.
Smartphone consumers are much more loyal to their brand of handset and carrier than feature phone consumers, highlighting the importance of capturing feature phone owners when they are starting to look to change their handset.
- Dominic Sunnebo, Consumer Insight Director for Kantar World Panel
Kantar’s report also looked at trends in the US and Australian Mobile Phone Markets. While Google’s Android OS is over 50% of the market share in both countries, (Australia 56.9% and US 50.2%), the US market share has decreased by 6.8% over the 12 month period. Kandar attributed the US market Share change to Apple’s iPhone’s new availability on Sprint.
It’s also interesting to note that although Android’s share is high in the USA market, it has decreased by 6.8% points over the year. This trend contrasts Apple’s growth, which is a reflection of a successful iPhone 4S release and the first time availability of the iPhone 4 and 4S on Sprint.
- Dominic Sunnebo, Consumer Insight Director for Kantar World Panel
So while Google received good news in regards to Europe and Australia, Google also needs to be mindful of Apple’s gains in the US market place.
