Nokia tops Smartphone Vendor Matrix

Nokia sits atop market intelligence firm ABI Research's newly-announced Smartphone Vendor Matrix, an analytical tool that promises to provide insight into vendors' positions in specific markets. Motorola and Research in Motion claimed the second and third positions in the countdown of worldwide smartphone vendors. According to ABI Research, the results were determined on the basis of multiple criteria related to product/company characteristics: For this matrix, ABI judged both innovation (e.g., user interface customization, patent portfolio, handset differentiation, support for third party application developers, common and concise API, and OS source code licenses) and implementation (smartphone shipments brand equity, choice of OS, smartphone market share, operator relationships, ODM partnerships and manufacturing facilities). Each vendor is assigned a numerical score aggregated and analyzed to factor its overall ranking.

"Nokia leads the global smartphone market, enjoying a market share of over 56 percent share in 2006," said ABI Research analyst Shailendra Pandey in a prepared statement. "Nokia's strength also ensures the leading position of Symbian in the mobile OS market. Motorola, RIM and Sony Ericsson match Nokia in terms of product innovation, but lag behind with respect to implementation, for example on parameters such as total shipments, and extensive distribution networks. In North America, however, Nokia trails Palm and RIM, which together hold more than two-thirds of the market through their sales of Treo and BlackBerry devices."

For more on the Smartphone Vendor Matrix:
- read this release

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