AAWP Comments the latest Windows Phone Share data from Kantar Worldpanel ...
... and compares calendar Q2 share to Q1 in 6 markets.
>> Kantar data shows shows UK and France as Windows Phone's strongest markets
Rafe Blandford
All About Windows Phone (AAWP)
July 30th 2013
allaboutwindowsphone.com
Two days ago Kantar released its latest set of Worldpanel data (June 2013) about smartphone sales data in a number of countries. The data shows continued year-on-year growth for Windows Phone in the UK (4.5% to 8.6%), France (2.3% to 9.0%), Mexico (1.9% to 7%), Australia (5.2% to 5.3%) and the US (2.9% to 4.0%). However, some markets, such as Germany (6.1% to 5.9%) and Italy (8.3% to 7.8%, show small drops in market share, painting a mixed picture for Windows Phone.
As with the figures for May, the June figures shows a small month-on-month decline for a number of markets (e.g. US down from 4.6% in May to 4% in June). These figures are more than offset by some substantial monthly increases in other markets, the biggest of which is France, where Windows Phone devices have grown from 7.4% of unit sales to 9% of units sales.
Consequently the overall trend for Windows Phone is continued growth, with Windows Phone now responsible for 6.9% of smartphone device sales by volume in the EU5 (Germany, UK, France, Italy, and Spain combined), up 2.2 percentage points on last year and 0.1% on last month. There is some evidence that the rate of growth has slowed slightly from earlier in the year; specifically the increase in sales unit share in the EU5 for Windows Phone was 0.9% in the first quarter versus 0.4% in the second quarter.
Windows Phone is still a small player compared to iOS and Android (18.5%, 69.8% and 6.8% in the EU5 respectively), but with BlackBerry continuing to fade (falling from 2.5% to 2.2%) its place as the third ecosystem must now be considered secure.
France (9%) replaces Italy (7.8%) as the strongest market for Windows Phone, with the UK close behind (8.6%). All three of these markets are notably ahead of the US (4%), which has now seen a full quarter of falling sales volume share. However, this trend may change in the months ahead, as the wider availability of the Lumia 520, and the introduction of the Lumia 925, 928 and 1020 start to have an impact on Windows Phone sales in Microsoft's home market.
In general the growth of Windows Phone has been driven by lower cost devices, such as the Lumia 520/521, 620 and 720. The recent introduction of the Lumia 925, 928 and 1020 should drive further growth, but their impact is unlikely to be fully felt until the data for October is available (three months of sales for the twelve week moving average). Moreover, it's worth remembering that by their very nature high-end devices sell in smaller number than low-end devices, and, in the case of Windows Phone, arguably, face a more competitive environment at the higher end of the market.
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- Eric - |
