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Android Growth Decreases iPad Market Share

By - Source: TechCrunch | B 36 comments

Despite leading market share, Apple's tablet loses 14 percent due to emergence of Android competitors.

While Apple's iPad continues to account for a large proportion of the tablet market, Google's Android platform is increasingly decreasing the former's market share.

Various models of the iPad gave Apple a 55 percent market share of tablet shipments during the third quarter. According to data stemming from ABI Research, that figure represents a 14 percent decline from the second quarter, as well as being its lowest level since the iPad's inception in 2010.

The firm said predominant reasons of the lost market share was due to Samsung, Amazon and Asus, who are a few of the technology firms who have adopted Google's mobile operating system Android, subsequently leading to accounting for 44 percent of tablets shipped. ABI Research expects the platform's market share to experience a continuous increase.

"As the OS of choice for the majority of device OEMs [original equipment manufacturers], we expect the Android ecosystem to continue growing in numbers -- new manufacturers, better device choices for reaching more markets, and more developers finding value from apps and content," ABI Research's Jeff Orr said in a statement.

The iPad Mini, released during the third quarter, is not expected to help Apple obtain market share from Google, ABI predicted.

"With the introduction of a smaller, lower-cost iPad Mini, Apple has acknowledged Android's beachhead of 7-inch-class tablets, though at the same time, it has failed to deliver a knock-out punch through innovation, pricing, and availability during the most critical selling period of the year," Orr explained.

As for Android's market share on smartphones, it's an entirely different outlook when compared to its fellow ecosystem. Google's platform accounted for for 72.4 percent of all smartphones sold during the third quarter, while iOS followed in a distant second place with a 13.9 percent share.

 

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Top Comments
  • 22 Hide
    krameynb , December 2, 2012 11:23 PM
    This must mean more lawsuits are on the way. If you can't dominate, litigate! Forget innovate. The new apple way...
  • 18 Hide
    esrever , December 2, 2012 11:21 PM
    I hope by this time next year, apply will no longer be relevant enough to have so much press.
  • 13 Hide
    kracker , December 2, 2012 11:28 PM
    ^+1

    If you lose, sue!
Other Comments
    Display all 36 comments.
  • 18 Hide
    esrever , December 2, 2012 11:21 PM
    I hope by this time next year, apply will no longer be relevant enough to have so much press.
  • 22 Hide
    krameynb , December 2, 2012 11:23 PM
    This must mean more lawsuits are on the way. If you can't dominate, litigate! Forget innovate. The new apple way...
  • 13 Hide
    kracker , December 2, 2012 11:28 PM
    ^+1

    If you lose, sue!
  • 8 Hide
    assasin32 , December 2, 2012 11:40 PM
    Lets be blunt Apple sells higher priced items, of course their not going to dominate the market when a competition finally shows up at the low end of the market. Especially when you can get good quality products there too.

    I've had a few family members pick up cheap capacitive touch screen tablets $50-80 on black friday and after it. Do they work well, kind've they get the job done. They wanted it for angry birds, internet, netflex, all of which it does well. Will a high end tablet perform better, yes. But not $300+ worth of performance increase for them which is what one of their Ipads will set them back.

    What Apple probably doesn't see if that these cheap Android users will get used to Android and will most likely come back to Android again when they buy a higher end tablet instead of going with something different like an iPad in order to avoid learning a new OS.

    With that in mind I think it was a dumb move to make a iPad mini at $330 price point they should have shot for $200 to dominate the high quality section of the lower end tablets which is filled with Kindle Fire, Nooks, Nexus, etc. Because at their current price point you can get a full size tablet quite easily in comparison to a gimped iPad mini.
  • -7 Hide
    Anonymous , December 2, 2012 11:48 PM
    Hey guys, its shipments, not sales. that has nothing to do with actual market share...
  • -7 Hide
    Anonymous , December 2, 2012 11:51 PM
    What people fail to realize that choice is always good for the end user. If Apple goes away then innovation will definitely suffer.
  • 4 Hide
    nforce4max , December 3, 2012 12:25 AM
    I honestly prefer Android Tablets over the iPad for obvious reasons such as removable storage and the fact that they are super cheap. They are now even turning up in yard sales lol.
  • 3 Hide
    tomfreak , December 3, 2012 12:34 AM
    About time for android tablet taking the share of ipad since the newer ones doesnt suck like android tablet 2 yrs b4 now.
  • 2 Hide
    baconeater , December 3, 2012 1:54 AM
    esreverI hope by this time next year, apply will no longer be relevant enough to have so much press.


    I suppose you mean "apple" by "apply", but why? do you know how many people apple employ? What good would it serve to have apple disappear? just so your senseless apple hate can result in something?

    Say what you want about apple, but none of the phone and tablet designs would be where they are without apple coming up with it first. I use a SGSIII and a Asus transformer prime, but I still give credit where it's due.
  • 4 Hide
    JOSHSKORN , December 3, 2012 2:18 AM
    We're getting closer and closer to the whole "who cares what 'new' things they're coming out with" and people will start buying less expensive stuff that "does the job", meaning, not Apple. Google will prevail over Apple.
  • -4 Hide
    wemakeourfuture , December 3, 2012 2:45 AM
    krameynbThis must mean more lawsuits are on the way. If you can't dominate, litigate! Forget innovate. The new apple way...


    Except Apple created this market space....

    Android devices have created no new markets.

    What major innovation has come from Android tablets? Incremental changes to specs is not innovation. You could argue multiple apps at the same time. Other than that limited feature (on very few of them) they added little innovation to this market
  • 0 Hide
    Anonymous , December 3, 2012 2:56 AM
    To baconeater:

    Yes, they do have some employees in US, but..do they have more employees in US or China? where do they really produce their things? in my personal opinion Apples is just like any other foreign company, it will not help in anyway to US buying their products....have you really compared todays android specs against iphone? do you thing is fair to pay 600 for an iPhone just for a brand name or 300 for nexus 4? additionally, I would suggest you to Google a little bit for some of the prototypes the Sony video player long before 2002, they look just like iphone designs for some unknown reason the judges ignored, and with rectangular shape (recently patented by one of your favorite company), be careful and dont invent anything with rectangular shape...lol
  • 0 Hide
    rocwurst , December 3, 2012 3:05 AM
    ABI's figures are from before the launch of the iPad mini so represent the artificial dip before the huge amount of pent-up demand exploded with the launch of the iPad mini.

    Apple sold more iPads in the first three days of the launch of the iPad mini than Google or Amazon sold in their entire first three months of sales (sorry I mean shipments). Google only managed 500,000 Nexus 7 tablets in their first month according to the manufacturer Asus. So much for these 7" Android tablets finally being able to earn the title of "iPad killer".

    In China, at the heart of the Android tablet flood, Apple's iPad captured an astounding 71% marketshare last quarter and that was also before the launch of the iPad mini.

    IBM's recent report that the iPad accounted for a massive 88% of all mobile e-commerce transactions over Black Friday combined with web browser marketshare of 91% and 98% according to Strategy Analytics and OnSwipe respectively confirms that actual sales of Android tablets are far lower than analysts would have you believe - either that or they are sitting unused in people's drawers. or something.

    Even in smartphones, iOS is going gangbusters. Kantar Worldpanel ComTech reports that in the last three months the iPhone has surged to 48.1% Marketshare in the influential US market beating Android which plunged from 63.3% to 46.7% in the same timeframe. And this is on the back of only 1 month's worth of iPhone 5 sales.
  • 1 Hide
    Anonymous , December 3, 2012 5:39 AM
    [With that in mind I think it was a dumb move to make a iPad mini at $330 price point they should have shot for $200 to dominate the high quality section of the lower end tablets which is filled with Kindle Fire, Nooks, Nexus, etc. Because at their current price point you can get a full size tablet quite easily in comparison to a gimped iPad mini.]

    Apple is in a tight spot. If they have offered a cheaper iPad at very low price, it will compete against its own iPad and reduce sales for it. For instance, at $200 for a 8Gb iPad mini, means the public can buy 2 iPad mini for $400 and has same amount of storage as the $500 iPad. Without a doubt the profit margin at $200 will not be 40%, which is current average profit margin for Apple. If the cheaper model is very successful, it may even mean Apple ends up having less profit even though the market share grows. Also, there is the possibility of cutting too much corner and getting bad rep for it that affect all product lines as a whole. It is not a easy situation for a company that is so used to selling high margin, premium product to get out of.
  • 0 Hide
    hardcore_gamer , December 3, 2012 6:13 AM
    EyeanWhat people fail to realize that choice is always good for the end user. If Apple goes away then innovation will definitely suffer.


    Innovation won't suffer if Apple dies. Windows RT will take on Android.
  • 0 Hide
    Cons29 , December 3, 2012 6:14 AM
    apple products are premium products, and they say the economy is down eh?
  • 0 Hide
    SAL-e , December 3, 2012 6:27 AM
    rocwurst...Apple sold more iPads in the first three days of the launch of the iPad mini than Google or Amazon sold in their entire first three months of sales (sorry I mean shipments).

    And this is on the back of only 1 month's worth of iPhone 5 sales.


    Right, comparing MAX number with AVERAGE number .... nice (ab)use of statistics. Then you building your argument by correlating to incompatible datasets. Where did you learn statistics? Tabloid like Business Insider, I would guess. I think they might hire you.
  • 0 Hide
    Solandri , December 3, 2012 8:39 AM
    assasin32With that in mind I think it was a dumb move to make a iPad mini at $330 price point they should have shot for $200 to dominate the high quality section of the lower end tablets which is filled with Kindle Fire, Nooks, Nexus, etc. Because at their current price point you can get a full size tablet quite easily in comparison to a gimped iPad mini.

    They had to price it north of $300 to avoid cannibalizing iPod Touch sales ($300 for 32GB version, same processor). Which should tell you something about the price/value of the iPod Touch...
  • 2 Hide
    cookoy , December 3, 2012 9:24 AM
    Android devices have several different manufacturers trying to outdo each other in features and prices. That's good instead of just sticking to one company dictating the price and feature set.
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