Kantar Worldpanel has released its smartphone sales data for three months, ending in August 2014. Similar to last month’s report, Windows Phone hardly shows any growth in terms of sales, except Italy and Spain where the operating system performed better compared to rest of the world.
An increase of 3.7 percent is reported in Italy as of August 2014, when compared with the last year’s August 2013 statistics. Spain also showed a rise in the sales of Windows Phone handsets, with a positive change of 2.2 percent compared to last year. China, one of the biggest smartphone markets, showed a fall of two percent. When compared with the last month’s report, it’s actually a fall in sales of Windows Phone in most regions, even in Italy and Spain.
Things may improve in the coming months, thanks to the free licensing program from the software giant, which allows users to use the operating system for free on devices with a screen size of less than nine inches. After the Windows 10 event, the company even announced that they managed to add almost 50 new hardware partners for Windows-related smartphones and tablets, which is definitely a positive sign.
For other operating systems, the picture was a little different. Google’s Android continues to follow a rising trend in most markets. As for Apple, the company followed a steady momentum, even in the anticipation of the upcoming iPhone 6 and 6 Plus. The Cupertino company has reported a record-breaking sales figures for the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus launch weekend, but despite the apparent hold off, it still managed to maintain a decent sales figures.
Dominic Sunnebo, strategic insight director at Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, had the following to say:
“Even before the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus were revealed, 85% of British iPhone owners planned to choose another iPhone at upgrade time. Loyalty has never been Apple’s problem, but attracting customers away from Android has been a challenge. Before the iPhone 6 was announced just 13% of Samsung owners planned to switch to Apple with many choosing Samsung devices because of their larger screens. With this screen size issue now addressed by Apple with the iPhone 6 Plus, it now remains to be seen how much of a barrier iPhone’s significant price premium will have on people switching to it.”
