Smart Phones, What Exactly Are They? What

Smart phones, what exactly are they? What differentiates smart phones from feature phones is their ability to do multitasking and run applications. First, there were PDAs (Personal Digital Assistant) which had functions like e-mail, web connectivity, to do list and few other computer-like functions while cell phones were used for calling and messaging mostly. A Smartphone is a combination of PDA and feature phone.

Changes over the past five years

Apple, to begin with, played an important role in bringing smart phones to the level where they were made available to mass consumers. That was three years ago. However, smart phones are the entity which existed in one form or the other since almost 19-20 years from now. The main difference between the earlier ones and the more recent ones is that the earlier ones were primarily used as enterprise devices and were too expensive to be acquired by most consumers. Nevertheless, with the emergence of smart phones in the mass consumer market and the widespread success of the I Phone, the carriers realized that they could capture the interests of their consumers for long periods by massively financing the latest, more advanced and superior smart phones. What started out as clunky monochromatic gadgets have now transformed to today's lustrous multimedia devices capable of supporting high definition videos and applications of all sorts. So there is no denying the impact, that I Phone has made on the society. Taking into consideration the fact that it has transitioned what was once an idiosyncratic gadget for nerds to nearly a necessity of life.

In revenue contributions worldwide, smart phones now go far beyond the share of feature phones. Gartner reported in November 2010 that the Smartphone sales have doubled over a period of one year and now they signify around 19% of total mobile sales. From the prior year the shipments of smart phones has increased to 72.1% whereas the shipments of feature-phones burgeoned only to 32% as compared to the year 2009. In March 2011, Insight reported some data which showed that worldwide Smartphone shipments increased by 74% from the year 2009 to the year 2011. The journey that began in 2007 when Steve Jobs introduced I Phone, factually lead to a gigantic revolution. Back then, Jobs had said that I Phone is literally five years ahead of every mobile phone. His words proved to be true and the endless stream of inventions began. In 2007, Google offered the first Android operating system, which was launched in 2008. Furthermore, inventions like I Pad came into being. Companies like Samsung, Nokia, HTC, LG etc. launched their own smart phones of various types. This competition is providing the world with superior, more advanced smart phones and other such inventions in every passing year.

Market strengths and weaknesses

I personally think Smartphone industry is in star position although it has attained 75% market penetration the growth has not stopped yet and its market share is increasing. According to survey by nelson in third quarter of 2011, smart phone ownership has reached 43% in United States. In addition, according to 2012-second quarter survey android holds 51.8% of all U.S. smart phones.

What adds strength to this market is the fact it provides lots of features in a very compact size, features such as camera, video recording, web connectivity, spreadsheets and word processor, radio, games, music player, GPS and many with multitasking capabilities.

The biggest criticism it gets are the battery timings since many smart phones comes in touch screen now they utilize more power and the battery does not last long as compared to feature phones

Apple and Samsung are the biggest competitors in the market with ever-increasing sales. In 2011 Samsung reported a record profit of $4.5 billion for its fourth quarter and sold 300 million phones out of which it is estimated 32 to 35 million were smart phones. Samsung sold an estimated 87.6 to 97.6 million smart phones in year 2011. Apple came close and sold 93 million units falling 4.6 million units short.

The most interesting figure to note is the year-to-year growth of both firms. Samsung has a whopping growth increase of 380.6% on the other hand Apple saw an increase of 141% in growth. If this trend goes on Samsung will create its place as market leader not only because of the growth but because it develops and uses cutting edge technology for instance it manufactures super AMOLED and supplies to Apple where as Apple does not manufactures any component itself.