COMSCORE, Inc. (NASDAQ:SCOR) has recently released its latest market share report of leading smartphone original equipment manufacturers, better known as OEMs. The report, which was published last week, clearly indicates that the market leader Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL), is only going one way, and that is upwards. Apple’s share of the OEM space was up 3.9 percentage points from its previous numbers reported in November 2012. The total smartphone market saw an overall growth rate of 8% for the period ending February 2013, from November levels.
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In the US alone, there were 133.7 million smartphone users, a 57% mobile penetration rate.
The latest report indicates Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) and Samsung are the only two companies registering positive momentum among all original equipment manufacturers.
One reason why Apple may have managed to register the highest growth in market share is that the company operates in both the OEM and operating system (OS) segments. Essentially, this means that unlike Google Inc. (NASDAQ:GOOG), which only offers exposure to the OS segment (this may be one of the motivations for its so-called X-Phone project), Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL) can have greater control over all aspects of production.
Discussions of vertical integration aside, the South Korea-based multinational conglomerate Samsung was the first runner-up on comScore’s list, and aside from Apple, the only other player to register a positive growth rate. Samsung, the manufacturer of mobile devices, is known for its Galaxy range of smartphones. In spite of having a lion’s share in the OEM market, Samsung still remains dependent on Google for its operating system, unlike Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL).
Per the report, other original equipment manufacturers like HTC, Motorola and LG, closed the period with negative growth rates. At the end of the reporting period, the trio had market share totals of 9.3%, 8.4% and 6.8% respectively. HTC was the biggest loser with a negative growth of -1.7 percentage points.
ComScore, a market leader in providing analytical services of mobile phone users, releases this data every three months through its MobiLens platform, and with this latest release, the company has completed 100 months of data collection and publication. The report, which was first published in November 2004, contains information regarding mobile market share, user demographics, market trends, device usage and media activities. According to its own metrics, ComScore covered eight countries, surveyed 3.12 million users and conducted 1176 surveys in its latest OEM breakdown.
Photo above: Apple Inc. (NASDAQ:AAPL)
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