Substitute of iPad
As the definition of iPad mentioned, iPad is a tablet that acts as a platform for audio-visual media integrating books, periodicals, movies, music, games and web content together. Its size and weight falls between those of contemporary smartphones and laptop computers and have similar function and appearance like them. Therefore, we define its substitute as smartphones and netbooks.
Smartphones
Smartphones and feature phones may be thought of as handheld computers integrated with a mobile telephone, but while most feature phones are able to run applications based on platforms such as Java ME, a smartphone usually allows the user to install and run more advanced applications. Smartphones run complete operating system software providing a platform for application developers. Thus, they combine the functions of a camera phone and a personal digital assistant (PDA). Operating systems that can be found on smartphones include Nokia's Symbian, Google's Android, Apple's iOS, RIM's BlackBerry OS, Microsoft's Windows Phone, Linux, Palm/HP's WebOS, Samsung's Bada and Nokia's Maemo etc.
Market Share by Operation System
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_operating_system)
Year Symbian Android RIM iOS Microsoft Other OSs
2010 37.6% 22.7% 16.0% 15.7% 4.2% 3.8%
2009 46.9% 3.9% 19.9% 14.4% 8.7% 6.1%
2008 52.4% 0.5% 16.6% 8.2% 11.8% 10.5%
2007 63.5% N/A 9.6% 2.7% 12.0% 12.1%
Development trend
An IDC report released today projects that the worldwide smartphone market will see a 49.2 percent growth and will ship an estimated 450 million units for 2011. (http://adtmag.com/articles/2011/03/29/strong-smartphone-growth-in-2011.aspx )
Market Share Predict
Smartphone sales will move 468 million units this year worldwide, representing a 57.7 increase from the 2010 sales figure, according to Gartner's report, "Forecast: Mobile Communications Devices by Open Operating System, Worldwide,...