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  • NPD: Android Shakes Up U.S. Smartphone Market

    The Android OS continued to shake up the U.S. mobile phone market in the Q1 of 2010, moving past Apple to take the number-two position among smartphone operating systems, according to NPD.

    NPD’s wireless market research reveals that based on unit sales to consumers last quarter the Android operating system moved into second position at 28 percent behind RIM’s OS (36 percent) and ahead of Apple’s OS (21 percent).

    “As in the past, carrier distribution and promotion have played a crucial role in determining smartphone market share,” said Ross Rubin, executive director of industry analysis for NPD. “In order to compete with the iPhone, Verizon Wireless has expanded its buy-one-get-one offer beyond RIM devices to now include all of their smartphones.”

    Strong sales of the Droid, Droid Eris, and Blackberry Curve via these promotions helped keep Verizon Wireless’s smartphone sales on par with AT&T in Q1. According to NPD, smartphone sales at AT&T comprised nearly a third of the entire smartphone market (32 percent), followed by Verizon Wireless (30 percent), T-Mobile (17 percent) and Sprint (15 percent).

    “Recent previews of BlackBerry 6, the recently announced acquisition of Palm by HP, and the pending release of Windows Phone 7 demonstrates the industry’s willingness to make investments to address consumer demand for smartphones and other mobile devices,” Rubin said. “Carriers continue to offer attractive pricing for devices, but will need to present other data-plan options to attract more customers in the future.”

    The report also shows that the continued popularity of messaging phones and smartphones resulted in slightly higher prices for all mobile phones, despite an overall drop in the number of mobile phones purchased in the first quarter.

    The average selling price for all mobile phones in Q1 reached $88, which is a 5 percent increase from Q1 2009. Smartphone unit prices, by comparison, averaged $151 in Q1 2010, which is a 3 percent decrease over the previous year.

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  • NPD: 75% of US iPhone and iPod Touch users Download Apps and Games

    The NPD’s "Entertainment Trends in America" update reveals three quarters of iPhone and iPod touch users are connecting to the Web to download entertainment content and apps.

    According to the latest update to the NPD’s tracking survey, 16 percent of Americans age 13 or older are using devices other than their home computers to download software applications, music, video, and other entertainment content from the Web.

    Based on NPD’s entertainment market research, 75 percent of iPhone and iPod Touch users are connecting to the Web to download entertainment content and apps, compared to 19 percent of game console users and 17 percent of Blu-ray Disc set-top product users.

    “It’s not surprising that Apple users are ahead of others when it comes to downloading Web-based content, given the breadth of the company’s app catalog and the head start iTunes had selling music for the iPod,” said Russ Crupnick, entertainment industry analyst for NPD.

    “Like other groups of early adopters, consumers downloading entertainment content are mostly younger and male; however, as app stores expand beyond Apple, as connected devices become more commonplace, and as connectivity is simplified we expect to see more activity on other devices and platforms,” he added.

    According to the report, among iPhone and iPod Touch users who downloaded content, free apps were the most popular download category, followed by video-game apps, and music downloads.

    Among consumers who connected via game consoles, game add-ons were far and away the most popular category, followed by purchased downloads of entire games, and movie rentals.

    In addition, one-third of Blu-ray Disc consumers who actually connected via their BD reported downloading a movie rental.

    “Music now competes with games and other apps for share of device, share of wallet, and share of time,” Crupnick said.

    He says that entertainment companies need to start to thinking of apps in broader terms, not only as a way of garnering direct sales from downloads, but also as a pathway to paying for additional entertainment content.

    “For example, an app that reviews movies could also be a direct channel for purchasing DVDs, BDs, or digital forms of video,” Crupnic concluded.