Android Sales Dwarf iPhone's This Quarter

By Isaac Chacon, TMCnet Contributor

In a Nielsen Company report, Google’s (News - Alert) Android outperformed Apple’s iPhone in sales last quarter 27 to 23 percent.

This surge in sales is not only a victory in the iPhone front, but also a personal one. Just a year ago, in the same quarter mind you, Androids only commanded four percent of smartphone sales. In just 365 days that number grew nearly seven times.

RIM’s Blackberry is still at the top with a 33 percent last quarter. However, Blackberry sales are on a steady decline and can get surpassed by either the iPhone or Android (News - Alert) this quarter.

Even with Android’s growing popularity, Apple has nothing to worry about because they still have a commanding lead in customer loyalty. Of their current subscribers, 89 percent of them will most likely buy another iPhone (News - Alert) as their next Smartphone. Android’s customer loyalty, 71 percent, is still relatively high compared to Blackberry’s weak 42 percent, but of the 29 percent disloyal customers, 21 percent want to transition to the iPhone. This is the Achilles’ heel of Google’s Android to fully outpace the iPhone in the smartphone race.

Nevertheless, Android is still a baby in the smartphone market and has much time to grow and maybe their loyalty will increase as they grow and mature in this competitive market.

(source: http://fixed-mobile-convergence.tmcnet.com/topics/mobile-communications/articles/93963-android-sales-dwarf-iphones-this-quarter.htm)