Apple (AAPL) and its iPhone with iOS are still the big dog in smartphones.
But the prophecies about Google (GOOG) and its Android OS catching Apple in ad impressions have come to pass, and the Android future is looking even brighter.
In October, Android caught iOS in smartphone ad space, according to a survey by Millennial Media, the largest independent ad network.
Both popular operating systems had 37 percent shares of the smartphone ad space market in October. Back in June’s survey, Apple had a dominating 56 percent compared with Android’s 17 percent.
Android’s gain has been Research In Motion (RIMM)’s loss. RIM’s BlackBerry had only had a 20 percent share in October. Nokia (NOK), which dominates the international market with Symbian, had only a two percent share in the USA, as did Microsoft (MSFT).
Philip Elmer-Dewitt spells out Android’s growth in a revealing series of charts in Fortune.
Anthony Agnello observed in Investor Place: “Google’s widely covered growth in the smartphone market has helped make their platform as attractive to advertisers as Apple’s, if not more so.”
Will Android take the lead in November? Kevin Krause in Phandroid said: “I wouldn’t call it a stretch to expect Android to be No. 1 come next month.”
Though Google is starting to take bites out of iPhone’s lunch, Millennial found that the iPad tablet is making inroads in mobile advertising, growing more than 100 percent in October over September.
Apple still is No. 1 in devices.
But Motorola (MOT) has been enhancing its image thanks to Android, recapturing some of its RAZR dumb phone glory days. Moto is now the No. 3 phone maker, as Droid 2 and Droid X are now in the Top 30 of mobile devices. RIM had six of the Top 30 devices.
Android Police’s Aaron Gingrich said Millennial’s stats are somewhat misleading, since AT&T (T) is underrepresented. He said this suggests “Millennial’s network exposure isn’t perfect: AT&T only represents nine percent, when in actuality it has a far larger customer base than Sprint (S) (13 percent according to Millennial). The discrepancy could be because of a higher rate of smartphone usage on Sprint, but it’s hard to say for sure without looking more deeply.”
