A Brief History Of Android Part 3: Rise Of The Robot

Recently Android founder and Google VP Andy Rubin tweeted that Android's growth was a credibility-straining 4.4% week on week. Think about that for a second – it's not just 4.4 times 52, it's compounding. He's talking activations here and those activations are one-off events, tied to the unique hardware serial in every cellphone built.

That's a very big claim, and would seem to suggest that Android will become the Windows of the smartphone world. For those unfamiliar with Windows in PC land, firstly welcome to Earth, and second, Windows has more than 90% of the personal computer marketplace. Huge! So is Android really headed for such domination? Let's take a look.

Andy Rubin's Android feat tweet

I don't doubt Mr Rubin's integrity so we can take the 4.4% growth in activations as fact. However, cynic that I am, I am slightly suspicious of unqualified numbers tweeted willy nilly so I stuck my math hat on and took a look (the things I have to do for AndroidNZ's loyal readers). And what I found was things aren't exactly what they seem.

From July 2010 to July 2011, Android activations increased from 160,000 per day to 550,000 per day. Yes, those are daily activation figures. Using that one year time frame as my base, I found that 4.4% increase in activations per week would have resulted in the 550,000 per day landmark occurring in week 29, not week 52. So what does that mean? Simply that Mr Rubin's 4.4% weekly increase cannot apply to such a long period, and we can only conclude that the time frame he references was a much shorter and more recent period than I'd personally accept as having real value.

I suspect his time frame was based on a single quarter, and I believe it demonstrates the dangers inherent in reporting figures without qualification. Nevertheless, my basic math skills reveal that over the 12 month period, Android grew at >2.5% w/w which isn't to be sneezed at and no doubt Android's competitors would dearly love to claim success such as that for themselves.

As things stand, there's no way to determine whether Android has peaked and the picture is unlikely to become clearer until another significant time period has passed. July 2012 will possibly deliver the answer. My Guess? Android will continue to take market share from all of it's competitors and its own share will continue to increase at least for all of 2012.

Can I put a number on it? Regrettably my crystal ball is in for repair (has been for a couple of decades) and I don't see the value of wishful thinking. But some things are apparent if you care to see. Android's current competition is led by Apple's iOS and the Cupertino consumer iGizmo maker has been keeping its powder dry. Lately though, it's been firing more of its remaining weapons in anger.

Cupertino strikes back

Apple has taken increasingly to litigation in order to handicap its competitors' efforts, by keeping them out of the market in various places around the world – Germany, The Netherlands and Australia, to mention the highest profile actions – and we're going to see this trend increasing as patent battles heat up.

You could see this as a tacit admission by Apple that they know their attempt to dominate smartphone share has failed so they are doing whatever they can to delay the inevitable as long as possible.

Or you could pop your Apple-tinted iFan glasses on and see this as Apple righteously defending its hard earned patents. But patent wars are normally the preliminary skirmishes prior to one corporation leveraging royalties out of the transgressor. Apple has adopted a different strategy. They have used the courts to invoke bans which materially impact the marketing and actual income of their competition.

In brief, (pardon the legal pun) they're attempting to litigate their competition away. And to an extent they've succeeded. Whether it's temporary or not remains to be seen but it's patently part of Apple's market strategy going forward (if you'll forgive another awful pun).

Besides the legal shenanigans, Apple has also dropped its “favoured carrier” approach in its markets and will now allow iPhones to be sold basically by any carrier that can afford to pay Apple's tithe. In doing so, they've increased their potential market significantly, which will garner the Cupertinians a large spike in sales and a larger ongoing marketplace in which to sell their kit.

Plus, there's the matter of their newest arrival, the iPhone 4S, as a “world phone”, being capable of working on any network on the planet. That won't apply to their two other handsets, the 3GS and iP4, which are not so capable but the 4S will be attractive to travellers and should give the Apple share a boost.

Expect these new super weapons to make Q4 a much improved one for Apple, but remember that these latest shots in the smartphone wars are their big guns and they've now fired them all. As a result, they will increasingly have to depend on software like Siri and their cloud offering to become the weapons for the fight and so far, that doesn't seem to be enough.

There's still the power of the brand though and that's a very strong advantage.

But the multitude of Android handset makers guarantees the ascendency of their offerings as far as tech development goes and there's no sign that Apple will be able to match them in the future. However, they shouldn't be counted out as they've pulled off some surprise counterattacks in the past.

Whither the other combatants?

Will RIM or WinPho be able to reel Android's growth in then? My prediction is “no” in the short term. Android's momentum at present is simply too strong and Blackberry and Windows Phone efforts are underperforming with both platforms losing share. Blackberry needs the new OS it has under development and a new generation of hardware to revitalise its offering while the Microsoft/Nokia partnership has yet to fire.

However, both RIM and Nokia have huge potential markets based on their previous and existing business customer relationships, and would not need to court the fickle consumer space to regenerate market share. It would be a reckless punter who'd count them out of the race. Just don't expect things to turn around quickly.

So does any of this market share drama really matter? Depends on your level of fanboyism really. The mobile space is huge, is getting steadily huger, and there's much room for multiple players. So the ascendency of Android doesn't mean the demise of one or other of its main competitors. But play the fanboy card, and it's a fight to the death apparently.

In the end though, all the action's with Android. Ice Cream Sandwich is arguably the best mobile operating system available. Top end Android-running hardware is demonstrably superior to that of their closest competitors Apple, RIM and Nokia in performance and breadth of offering, something that presents serious challenges to competitors of the little green robot.

In our final chapter in this series, we'll taste that Ice Cream Sandwich, pop some tablets, experience fragmented development and maybe get the crystal ball back from the repairer. Hope to see you then.