Apple’s iPad continues to slug through the mobile computing market, dominating all other tablets, notebook computers and mini-notebook computers.
Mashable has the story, detailing a report from NPD DisplaySearch that found that Apple moved more than 17.2 million mobile PCs in the first quarter of 2012. Of that number, 80 percent of those sales were iPads: around 13.6 million. And iPad saw sales increase 162 percent between the first quarter of 2011 and Q1 2012. Of all the tablets shipped in the Q1 2012, Apple’s iPad made up 62.8 percent of them.
In the No. 2 slot in worldwide tablet shipments for the period was Samsung, but its share of the market was miniscule by comparison – a mere 7.5 percent. Behind Apple in the total mobile PC market was HP with 8.9 million units shipped (it also led the notebook market); after it came Acer, Lenovo and Dell.
According to NPD, China helped a lot of the growth in the mobile PC market. The region saw 13 percent of total mobile PC market growth between the first quarter of last year and 2012, with 16 percent for tablets and 12 percent for notebooks and mini-notebooks.
Meanwhile, over in the smartphone department, Apple also saw some favorable numbers. As SlashGear notes, Apple’s portion of the worldwide smartphone market jumped to 23 percent in the first quarter of 2012, according to a report from IDC. That was an 88.7 percent increase over the same period last year.
Android continued its march across the smartphone market, too, and continued to outpace Apple. Google’s mobile operating system now accounts for 59 percent of the worldwide smartphone market, and grew 145 percent from Q1 2011 to Q1 2012. During the same period, Nokia’s Symbian dropped 60.6 percent around the world to 6.8 percent of the market, and Research In Motion’s BlackBerry dropped 29.7 percent to hold 6.4 percent of the market.
In total, all the numbers make up a familiar story. The iPad continues to smash through the tablet market with no end in sight, and no other company even comes close to challenging Apple’s hold over it. There was a brief surge in the Amazon Kindle Fire in the U.S. during the holiday season of 2011 and the first quarter of 2012, but that device isn’t available everywhere and even it has dropped off some.
Apple is making gains in the iPhone department, although not nearly as fast as Android. The advantages of Google’s operating system – namely, that it’s free – is helping it to keep up pace, as are its constant improvements. Apple’s making good pace, but it doesn’t look as though iOS is going to take the lead in the smartphone race anytime soon.
Still, it seems if Apple continues to do what it’s been doing, it should keep being a dominant force in the mobile sphere, and while Android as a group continues to challenge it, individually, other device makers struggle to compete.
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