Has Google Already Lost The Smartphone Wars?

I recently ran across an interesting article written by Sascha Segan from PCMag.com asking an interesting question, "Has Android Already Failed?" Personally, like Steve Mueller from Mobility Site, I feel it is way too early to write the Android platform off. Let's face it, when Google and HTC teamed up to release the T-Mobile G1 (HTC Dream) the handset wasn't really built around the needs of the average consumer. Sure the HTC Dream is a great little handset on its own, but you would have to be blind to not see that this device was built for the sole purpose of having development hardware on the market for individuals interested in the platform as a whole. It is, after all, a dream device for the open source junkie in your life. You can build almost anything you want for it or install any of the various homebrew Android operating systems out there in the digital realm that are ready and waiting to be flashed to the handset.

What annoys me about these articles however is just the assumption that Android is a failure because it has sold so few handsets over the course of its first six months on the market. I personally consider selling 1 million handsets a success and I seem to remember all the Windows Mobile fanboys out there, myself included, shouting from the rooftops when the HTC Touch Diamond sold its first million handsets. 

There are other points in these articles that bother me as well such as assuming Android is a failure because everyone has announced a handsets to be released on the platform and only HTC has produced one at this moment in time. Handsets take device manufacturers a while to build. HTC didn't build the Dream in only one day and I bet their second Android handset, the HTC Magic, was in development either during the development of the Dream or shortly after its release. New Android handsets will come and when they do I would not be surprised to see them come in bulk from different carriers and ODMs at once and chances are non of them are going to show up before Google officially releases, what everyone considers, to be the first consumer ready version of the operating system - Android 1.5. That is just how the mobile game goes and we see it happen all the time with Windows Mobile handsets.

All of that above though is just speculation and opinion, just like the article that triggered this response, so as to not flood the Interwebs with even more speculation and opinion based stories, here are the reasons as to why I think Android is a sleeper success story that should have Microsoft, Apple, and Palm shaking in their boots, if not paying really close attention to the next upcoming 6 to 12 months.

iPhone Sales Figures

I have heard a lot of talk lately comparing the 6 months sales figures of the iPhone to the G1 and just assuming that it means the iPhone trumps all other man-made creations eight ways from Sunday. This isn't the case and here is why:

According to Ars Technica in the first 6 months the iPhone was on the market we saw sales that were generously estimated to be between 3.5 and 4 million handsets sold. These numbers are incredibly impressive, sure, but you have to keep in mind that iPhone was released nationwide on the AT&T network.

T-Mobile however severely limited the availability of the T-Mobile G1 during the initial launch to only markets that were running their newly installed HSDPA towers, which meant that it was released in only 21 markets. The T-Mobile G1 continued to only be sold in those 3G markets until January 2009 when it was finally released in non-3G markets. While spending over half of it's shelf life being sold in only a tiny fraction of the country it is a miracle the device even made it to a million sold handsets so quickly. Can you imagine how many HTC Dream handsets would be in the wild now if T-Mobile launched the device in every market available back in Q4 2008?

Carrier Subscription base

At the time that AT&T sold roughly 4 million iPhones in January 2008 the carrier had a customer base of roughly 70 million subscribers. If you do the math that means thats roughly 5.7% of AT&T's subscriber base owned an iPhone within the first 6 months of its release. Those aren't numbers to laugh at and it is easy to see why AT&T has wanted to keep the iPhone on its network exclusively for so long.

T-Mobile on the other hand, which only has a meager 32.8 million subscribers as of January 2009, has managed to put this handset - which sold in such limited conditions - into the hands of over 3% of its subscribers.  That isn’t too shabby seeing as how AT&T has over 46% of the subscribers then T-Mobile has. What does that mean? That means AT&T had 37.2 million more oppurtunities to sell the iPhone than T-mobile did to sell the G1. On top of that T-Mobile also reports that the G1 makes up for over 40% of the HSDPA enabled devices on their small but rapidly growing 3G network. Impressive indeed.

Mobile Web

Not too long ago our very own Ed Hansberry reported on the browsing habits of mobile web users. In the graph that was shown during the first few months since its launch Android managed to capture a little over 6% of the mobile web market which was just a tad bit under Windows Mobile which had over 20 million devices on the market and only managed to caputre 6.9% of mobile web browsing at the time the graph was put together.

Mobile Internet browsing is the next big thing, there is no doubt about that, and browsing the web from an Android device has been nothing short of pleasant. Mobile WebKit is an exciting piece of technology and as we see newer versions of the iPhone, WebOS and Android platforms hit the market we will see that browser engine evolve to the point where a majority of your web browsing could be done from your handset instead of sitting in front of a computer screen.

Conclusion

Google's Android platform is far from being a total failure. It is easy for companies such as Apple and Microsoft to ignore the platform. After all, out of all the smartphone operating systems out their Android does come in dead last in the looks department and if you never use the handset yourself all you really know about it is how it looks in the images you see.

What Android is capable of however is nothing short of magical and what Android has accomplished so far - in spite of being severely handicapped by T-Mobile at launch - is astonishing. For any carrier to have 3-5% of their installed user base using one handset in such a limited amount of time, when that carrier could have literally hundreds of older and newer handset models on their network at any given time is nothing short of a feat of the gods and nowhere near failure status. I also shouldn't have to remind anyone that it isn't even May yet. We still have another 8 months to go before we're in 2010 so maybe we shouldn’t start harping on manufacturers for not releasing Android devices as quickly as the Interwebs would like. I would rather have the ODMs take their time and release a quality product instead of dropping a bunch of dung on us.

I shot an email off to my friend Tim who works for T-Mobile to see if I get them to comment on this article but unfortunately he was unavailable and told me "Sorry, we can't respond to your email right now - we're too busy swimming around in the gigantic pile of money the G1 is making us."

Rocco Augusto is the Managing Editor of Smartphone Thoughts and owns and operates Skimbee Studios – a small Web Development studio based out of Portland, OR. When Rocco is not up to his elbows in gadgets and technology, you can usually find him trying to keep up with his incredibly peppy and energetic daughter or wasting hours away on Twitter.