Samsung Bada unveiled as new iPhone, Android platform rival
Samsung, the world's second largest phone maker globally after Nokia, has announced Bada as its own new smartphone platform which it hopes to use to gain entry into the sophisticated phone market.
Samsung's Bada, the Korean word for "ocean," is reportedly built on top of Linux and is expected to be released with an open SDK next month, with the first Bada phones to be introduced early next year. Unlike Symbian or Android, Samsung appears to be developing its new mobile platform and software market solely for the benefit of its own phones, much like RIM, Apple, and Palm.
Searching for a smartphone platform
The company's current smartphone lineup is about 80% Windows Mobile and 20% Symbian. A year ago, the company released the new Windows Mobile Omnia as its flagship offering, but followed up this year with the Omnia HD using Symbian instead, a move identical to Sony Ericsson's release of the Windows Mobile Xperia X1 followed by this year's Symbian-based Idou.
Also like Sony Ericsson, Samsung announced plans earlier this year to back Android instead of Symbian in the future, with an announcement that 30% of its phones next year would use Android. That expansion was expected to come from reduced use of Windows Mobile, but now Samsung is indicating that it will phase out Symbian entirely, drastically reduce the use of Windows Mobile, and introduce the new Bada as its preferred smartphone operating system.
HMC investment securities analyst Greg Noh outlined Samsung's expected smartphone mix showing Symbian completely phased out by 2011, and Samsung's own Bada making up half of its portfolio by 2012, with the remainder being about 30% Android and 20% Windows Mobile.
Another big phone maker eyes a world outside of Android
In the general mobile phone market, Samsung has been making incremental progress toward leader Nokia with around 20% of the global phone market. It currently sells more phones than the rest of the top five makers (LG, Sony Ericsson and Motorola) combined. In smartphones however, Samsung has just recently broke into the top five vendors, well behind Nokia, RIM, Apple, and HTC with sales of just 1.4 million in the most recent quarter, the same figure as last year. With the growth in smartphones, that contributed to Samsung's market share of advanced phones actually slipping slightly year over year.
Android advocates widely expected Samsung to warmly adopt Google's platform, as it provides a free alternative to the Windows Mobile software the company currently uses. Instead, Samsung is following Nokia's lead in working to maintain its own destiny independent of Google. Nokia is both sponsoring the Symbian Foundation and its own Maemo Linux distribution.
Samsung's interest in creating and managing its own smartphone platform also reflects the interests of second place smartphone vendor RIM and its BlackBerry OS, and Apple in third place with the iPhone. Palm has followed a similar strategy with its own proprietary WebOS.
As a smartphone vendor experienced with using third party software from Microsoft and Symbian, Samsung's interest in developing and maintaining its own proprietary platform rather than trying to adapt Android to create differentiated phones in a competitive market is a dramatic refutal of the conventional thinking that Android will explode among vendors next year.
Instead, Samsung's considerable resources will be devoted toward its own new platform, creating more competition and differentiation in options among smartphone platforms and reducing the energy being channeled toward licensed operating systems, with Windows Mobile being the biggest loser (with the loss of around 1.2 million of the 3.6 million Windows Mobile phones that shipped in Q3 2009), Symbian losing a significant licensee entirely, and Android facing a rival new marketplace for mobile software.
Samsung expects to release more information to developers about its SDK plans next month via its Bada website.
Samsung's Bada, the Korean word for "ocean," is reportedly built on top of Linux and is expected to be released with an open SDK next month, with the first Bada phones to be introduced early next year. Unlike Symbian or Android, Samsung appears to be developing its new mobile platform and software market solely for the benefit of its own phones, much like RIM, Apple, and Palm.
Searching for a smartphone platform
The company's current smartphone lineup is about 80% Windows Mobile and 20% Symbian. A year ago, the company released the new Windows Mobile Omnia as its flagship offering, but followed up this year with the Omnia HD using Symbian instead, a move identical to Sony Ericsson's release of the Windows Mobile Xperia X1 followed by this year's Symbian-based Idou.
Also like Sony Ericsson, Samsung announced plans earlier this year to back Android instead of Symbian in the future, with an announcement that 30% of its phones next year would use Android. That expansion was expected to come from reduced use of Windows Mobile, but now Samsung is indicating that it will phase out Symbian entirely, drastically reduce the use of Windows Mobile, and introduce the new Bada as its preferred smartphone operating system.
HMC investment securities analyst Greg Noh outlined Samsung's expected smartphone mix showing Symbian completely phased out by 2011, and Samsung's own Bada making up half of its portfolio by 2012, with the remainder being about 30% Android and 20% Windows Mobile.
Another big phone maker eyes a world outside of Android
In the general mobile phone market, Samsung has been making incremental progress toward leader Nokia with around 20% of the global phone market. It currently sells more phones than the rest of the top five makers (LG, Sony Ericsson and Motorola) combined. In smartphones however, Samsung has just recently broke into the top five vendors, well behind Nokia, RIM, Apple, and HTC with sales of just 1.4 million in the most recent quarter, the same figure as last year. With the growth in smartphones, that contributed to Samsung's market share of advanced phones actually slipping slightly year over year.
Android advocates widely expected Samsung to warmly adopt Google's platform, as it provides a free alternative to the Windows Mobile software the company currently uses. Instead, Samsung is following Nokia's lead in working to maintain its own destiny independent of Google. Nokia is both sponsoring the Symbian Foundation and its own Maemo Linux distribution.
Samsung's interest in creating and managing its own smartphone platform also reflects the interests of second place smartphone vendor RIM and its BlackBerry OS, and Apple in third place with the iPhone. Palm has followed a similar strategy with its own proprietary WebOS.
As a smartphone vendor experienced with using third party software from Microsoft and Symbian, Samsung's interest in developing and maintaining its own proprietary platform rather than trying to adapt Android to create differentiated phones in a competitive market is a dramatic refutal of the conventional thinking that Android will explode among vendors next year.
Instead, Samsung's considerable resources will be devoted toward its own new platform, creating more competition and differentiation in options among smartphone platforms and reducing the energy being channeled toward licensed operating systems, with Windows Mobile being the biggest loser (with the loss of around 1.2 million of the 3.6 million Windows Mobile phones that shipped in Q3 2009), Symbian losing a significant licensee entirely, and Android facing a rival new marketplace for mobile software.
Samsung expects to release more information to developers about its SDK plans next month via its Bada website.
Comments
Bada-Bing!
(beat you to it Quadra
So, if Samsung expands their tie-in with Microsoft and does a special search engine for this smartphone it will be:
Bada-Bing!
Holy shit. Could it be possible that's the very reason why Microsoft went with "bing" at the last moment? I don't know if I'd put it past them
Another big phone maker eyes a world outside of Android
Come join the party, everyone's invited!
How can we go with two different rating companies?
So, if Samsung expands their tie-in with Microsoft and does a special search engine for this smartphone it will be: Bada-Bing!
Lol bada bing. Hahaha
Except instead of pushing WinMo on Samsung, I suggest Microsoft joins Samsung in developing another linux alternative to Android, they can call it LinMo, and the phone can still be called Bada-Bing
Something is off with some of the numbers. They've rounded some off in one chart, but not in another. Also, and if I'm missing something here, point it out, but it seems to me that both Apple and RIM should have the same percentage in both smartphone charts, as both only use their own OS, and so the numbers of smartphones sold in total by everyone should be the same whether going by OS or maker. As the same should be true for Apple and RIM, the percentage should be the same for both charts.
How can we go with two different rating companies?
(I assume you caught the footnotes: "Reported figures differ slightly by research firm.")
Each firm might have different methods of arriving at the same overall figures. The differences between 'Platform' and 'Maker' for RIM and Apple are within rounding error, although the 19% to 21% jump is a bit more than 17% to 18%. Close enough for government work.
(I assume you caught the footnotes: "Reported figures differ slightly by research firm.")
Each firm might have different methods of arriving at the same overall figures. The differences between 'Platform' and 'Maker' for RIM and Apple are within rounding error, although the 19% to 21% jump is a bit more than 17% to 18%. Close enough for government work.
That's why I asked how we could go with different rating companies. Their numbers are always different. As all of these companies rate for the same things, I don't see why they couldn't have gotten ratings from one company instead of three.
That's why I asked how we could go with different rating companies. Their numbers are always different. As all of these companies rate for the same things, I don't see why they couldn't have gotten ratings from one company instead of three.
Comparing the earlier Canalys numbers, it appears that only IDG reported Samsung figures (which wasn't in the top five previously), and and only Strategy Analytics presented mobile numbers. Rather than presenting part of the story, the article presents three sides of the same situation.
It's also interesting to see proof that IDG/Gartner/Calalys and others are presenting their estimates of the industry, not some irrefutable proof numbers. So take all market share and sales numbers with a grain of salt, as they are only estimates. Getting multiple estimates also helps even out perspective of the industry.
Comparing the earlier Canalys numbers, it appears that only IDG reported Samsung figures (which wasn't in the top five previously), and and only Strategy Analytics presented mobile numbers. Rather than presenting part of the story, the article presents three sides of the same situation.
It's also interesting to see proof that IDG/Gartner/Calalys and others are presenting their estimates of the industry, not some irrefutable proof numbers. So take all market share and sales numbers with a grain of salt, as they are only estimates. Getting multiple estimates also helps even out perspective of the industry.
I don't entirely agree. All of these companies do the same ratings. If we want to see a picture from all three, then they can all be presented.
But to present one rating by one company, and a different, but somewhat similar one by another, is misleading, and confusing.
So, if Samsung expands their tie-in with Microsoft and does a special search engine for this smartphone it will be:
Bada-Bing!
Makes good sense... Should be the 6th Element on future charts
Who does that leave to use it?
Nokia, Symbian (occassionally Windows, but less and less so)
Palm, Palm OS
RIM, their own system, the name of which escapes me.
Apple, iPhone OS (OS X-ish)
Motorola, Android
Sony Errikson, Android (is that correct?)
HTC, Android
LG, Android
um...
Who's left?
Do Panasonic still make phones? Is Dell still trying to develop a mobile? um... Siemens? (or have they given up...)
So either the companies are paying loads to develop their own, or deciding to pay less to develop their own 'skins' of Android. No one is paying to license. I wonder if this will filter back into computers. I wonder...
I see only one reason for Bada. Vanity.
Control.
Control.
So the lesson of Windows and PlaysforSure is rapidly sinking in. If you want to be a real player in the market, you need to control your own platform. Otherwise, you're in the worst part of the market - the low-margin undifferentiated commodity (Windows) or out of the market completely (PlaysforSure until it died).
Nokia and Samsung now understand. Apple, RIM, and Palm have always understood, though Palm ventured off-course because the "analysts" said they should follow the Windows model and they thus screwed up PalmOS and got screwed by WinMo.
Will Motorola, SonyEricsson, LG, and HTC eventually learn their lesson?
So the lesson of Windows and PlaysforSure is rapidly sinking in. If you want to be a real player in the market, you need to control your own platform. Otherwise, you're in the worst part of the market - the low-margin undifferentiated commodity (Windows) or out of the market completely (PlaysforSure until it died).
Despite Ballmer saying that Apple won?t get anywhere unless they license their mobile OS, i have a feeling that MS? only recourse is to due what it did with the Zune, and make a product that is entirely in the MS ecosystem. I wouldn?t be surprised to see a Zune Phone hit the market. It would be the best competitor to the iPhone in media playback. Even Android v2.0 is severely lacking in this area, and it doesn?t look like it?ll be changing quickly.
\t- Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer, April 30, 2007