From c|net:
Google's Android operating system was the big winner in a big time for worldwide phone shipments, market researcher Strategy Analytics reported Wednesday.
Android captured 88 percent of all smartphone shipped in the third quarter of 2016, a period that also marks the fastest growth rate in a year. "Android's gain came at the expense of every major rival platform," Strategy Analytics' Linda Sui said in a press release.
"Apple iOS lost ground to Android and dipped to 12 percent [market]share," primarily because of "lackluster" sales in China and Africa, she said.
And don't bother looking for BlackBerry and Microsoft Windows phones in the mix. They "all but disappeared" in the period between July 1 and the end of September.
To put this in perspective, even with the smartphone market reaching maturity, and with Samsung's Galaxy Note 7 being recalled, there were still about 375 million smartphones shipped in the third quarter of 2016, up 6 percent from the same period last year. 88% of that is 330 million, which means that there were nearly as many Android smartphones shipped in the 3rd quarter alone, as there were PCs switched to Windows 10 in all of the last year.
If you were wondering why Windows 10's stagnant growth is a big deal for Microsoft, look no further. If you're wondering why Satya Nadella is talking up AR and VR for their shareholders, or why Microsoft is still spending on ARM-based versions of their OS, or trying to ensure that Windows 10 forms a big part of the Internet of Things, look no further.
The problem is that AR and VR are future technologies, devices with numerous unresolved issues including the fact that the people pushing the technology have yet to come up with any application to which the technology can be applied, which can't be done just as effectively, or at least well enough, without a dose of AR/VR snake oil. The Internet of Things has similar issues -- microchip manufacturers have every reason to be excited about putting microchips into everything you use in a day, especially now that PC sales are stagnant and smartphone sales are levelling off, but so far there's very little in the IoT package that consumers will actually find useful or care about, or any sign of IoT in the metrics of our economy.
AR/VR and IoT may well be the next big things, and there are plenty of tech companies that are betting heavily on these things being the future, but there's very little actual evidence, at least so far, that they're right about that. And there's no recent evidence that Microsoft are still a sufficiently innovative company to be able to capitalize on these technologies, even if they do become a thing.
Microsoft is a giant company, with a lot of money in the bank, and a huge footprint in our computer-controlled civilization, so they're not going to go under anytime soon, but have no illusions: they're facing some serious headwinds, with no sign that they're on currently heading in the right direction, or that they're able to change course if they need to. This is a big problem, and with 90% of our desktop and laptops running Windows, it's a problem that will affect you, even if you have little or no say in how they choose to address it.
Odds are that you have both an Android phone and a Windows PC, and at this point probably can't get through your week without using both of them. Right now, the company that will determine the fate of one of those platforms is floundering. Even if you hate Microsoft (and I'll admit that I've had moments in the last year when I've hated Microsoft), this is not a good thing.
It's your move, Microsoft. Please make it better than your other recent moves.