The mobile operating system market is relatively recent. Many major companies hailing from the computer and mobile sector are competing in order to take over this huge market. Until very recently, each mobile manufacturer developed its own proprietary operating system. Most of the mobile phones were not compatible, even those of the same brand. The digital convergence, the high costs of proprietary environmental systems development and a global willingness to move towards an open operating system encouraged the market to change directions.
The enterprise market made the first step. It needed a mobile OS that could be integrated in its information system in order to have a better control over their workforce and ensure an efficient information sharing. We can now identify several vendors trying to develop their market shares in this sector. Microsoft, Symbian (Nokia, Sony-Ericsson, Motorola and PSION), RIM-BlackBerry, PALM, Linux and newcomer Apple are competing and trying to dominate this market. All of them are applying different strategies and taking advantage of their different strengths.
All these companies come from related markets, the mobile phone/handheld industry or the computer OS market. They have very good experience of the customers needs, but they are still using completely differentapproaches.The stakes in the mobile operating system market are huge. More than 990 million mobile phones were sold around the world in 2006 whereas “only” 330 million computers were sold at the same time.
For the time being, OS are only integrated in Smartphones which represent40 million units. However, this number is expected to rise to 160 million units by 2009, a 400% growth in three years.Such a bullish market could be considered a positive indication of growth for these companies.We will try to understand the benefits they hope to achieve from it.During this research, I will try to understand to what extent competitive advantages are useful
[...] We will only analyze the User Interface developers using a Linux kernel such as Monta Vista Linux, Google and Access ANALYZING THE MOBILE OS VALUE CHAIN Mobile Operating Systems companies are very different from one to another. If the similar objective is to provide the best OS for Mobile devices, the different sizes of competitors and the different paths took in order to increase market shares are mostly explained by different level of control over the value chain. We will see for example that two main types of OS are emerging, enterprise or mass market focused. [...]
[...] If OS vendors developing both the UI and the kernel have a total control over the technical knowledge, Operating systems developers based on Linux and focusing on the UI may not have the capacity to answer customers needs as rapidly as competitors. The reduced control over their value chain could be a threat for such Operating systems vendors. The experience of Google in the internet industry could become an asset since the connectivity and data exchanges between Smartphones are growing with mobile internet usage. [...]
[...] The growing need for a mobile IT strategy leads IT managers to focus on mobile OS that have backward compatibility and portability characteristics APPLE HISTORY Apple has great knowledge of computer Operating Systems with Mac OS used on all of its computers. The company managed to build a strong database of loyal customers, attracted by the user friendly interface, the simplicity and reliability of the Operating System. The company entered recently on the OS mobile market with the commercialization of the iPhone in June 2007. [...]
[...] 35 THREATS Other operating systems better suited to mobile environment: The Windows Mobile system is very heavy and not so much user friendly. The system has been designed to be implemented in companies' network and offers numbers of configuration options useless for the basic customer. A simplification of this one is compulsory in order to be successful in the mass market. D Power intimidates potential partners: Microsoft can already be considered as a monopolistic company on the computer OS market. [...]
[...] In this part, we will try to understand the stakes for operating software developer's partners and their interest to go toward standardzation Mobile OS business ecosystem MOBILE OPERATORS Mobile operators are the main partners of Operating Systems developer since they own mobile phone's main channels of distribution. They usually work with both mobile OS developers and Mobile manufacturers in order to put Smartphones on the market. The standardization of mobile OS will have many repercussions for mobile operators. Launch of new services The standardization will enable mobile operators to launch new services since communication between devices will improve. [...]
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