Prospects for a fourth smartphone OS: matching industry intent with market demand

Transcription

1 Research Viewpoint Prospects for a fourth smartphone OS: matching industry intent with market demand June 2014 Ronan de Renesse

2 2 About this report This report assesses the potential impact of a fourth major operating system (OS) in the smartphone market, after Android, ios and Windows Phone. It is structured as follows. Figure 1: Topics and companies covered in this report [Source: Analysys Mason, 2014] Topics Companies Market demand analysis: identifies areas of growth in the smartphone market where a new OS may emerge and the corresponding strategic relevance to vendors. Fourth smartphone OS profiles: SWOT analysis and ratings of Firefox OS, Sailfish OS, Tizen and Ubuntu Touch. Market outlook: 5-year worldwide scenario-based forecasts by OS, market drivers and inhibitors, and potential market disruptors. Mobile OS Smartphones Wearables Vendor strategies Industry partnerships Apple Google Mozilla Samsung Canonical Jolla Microsoft Nokia Telefónica Key questions answered in this report: Is there market demand for a fourth mobile OS and what relevance does it have to operators and vendors? Which of the new mobile OSs are most likely to succeed and what impact could they have on operators, vendors and content providers? What will be the impact of potential market disruptors such as new device categories (wearables, for example), sub-usd25 entry-level smartphones, and the HTML5 developer ecosystem? Who needs to read this report: Strategy executives, and directors and managers within mobile operators who are managing the device portfolio and the development of potential operator-branded device strategies. Device manufacturers involved in the development and integration of platforms and devices in the consumer electronics space that are looking for an alternative OS. Executives within the content creator, developer and publisher industries who want to evaluate new app distribution channels and partnerships.

3 6 The history of mobile OSs shows a high failure rate in the creation, development and sustainability of new OSs Figure 4: Mobile OS timeline [Source: Analysys Mason, 2014] Symbian OS Palm OS Maemo ios Android WebOS MeeGo Tizen Sailfish OS Ubuntu Touch Key Old OS Discontinued OS Windows CE Bada OS Firefox OS BlackBerry Windows Phone BlackBerry 10 Major OS New OS The mobile OS market is very competitive. Of the 16 main mobile OSs launched in the past 14 years, only two Android and ios dominate the market, with more than 85% market share of unit sales in Market leaders such as Nokia and Samsung have allocated very large budgets to the creation and development of a new mobile OS, without much success. Scale, good performance and large-scale funding are required but are not sufficient to gain market share in the mobile OS market. Value-chain partnerships, developer support and the flexibility of the platform are key elements that typically characterise a successful mobile OS. These can take many years to build, which is why Firefox OS, Sailfish OS, Tizen and Ubuntu still have a long way to go before they can make a significant impact on the market. 1 Old OS refers to the first smartphone OSSs, which have been updated and renamed rather than properly discontinued or abandoned. BlackBerry 10 is a major revamp of the original BlackBerry OS, so the two are presented separately in Figure 4.

4 15 About the author Ronan de Renesse (Principal Analyst) is the lead analyst for Analysys Mason s Mobile Devices and Digital Economy research programmes. His primary areas of specialisation include smartphone and tablet adoption, rich media applications and services on mobile, mobile content and data monetisation, and over-the-top (OTT) company strategies. Ronan has been analysing the telecoms and media industry since Prior to joining Analysys Mason, Ronan was a Senior Analyst and the Head of Mobile at IHS Screen Digest, where he had overall responsibility for the Mobile Media Intelligence service and all related activities. For the past 5 years, Ronan has led the conception and development of various mobile media and technology forecasts, including those for mobile applications, mobile broadband and smartphones. Ronan has also written thought-leadership reports on Facebook and Google's mobile strategies, and participated in the production of Analysys Mason s key primary research projects such as the Connected Consumer, Tablet survey and Consumer smartphone usage report series. Before becoming an industry analyst, Ronan was an academic researcher at the Centre for Telecommunications Research at King s College London. He had numerous articles published in international technology journals and also gave various presentations at high-profile conferences. Ronan holds a PhD in Telecommunications from King s College London. He has also participated on the GSMA Global Mobile Awards judging panel.

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