According to IDC's Worldwide Handheld Qview, the worldwide market for handheld devices experienced its sixth consecutive quarter of year-over-year decline in the second quarter of 2005. Device shipments decreased 20.8% compared to the same quarter one year ago and fell 8.5% sequentially in 2Q05 to 1.7 million units.
Despite the continued decline, manufacturers remain committed to driving innovation throughout their product portfolios. Notable are GPS solutions and mobile manager. And manufacturers are moving to balance these advancements with converged mobile devices to provide a full range of options to modern mobile consumers and enterprises.
Kevin Burden, research manager of IDC's Mobile Devices program, says "... handheld device manufacturers are striving to create new solutions that leverage the unique hardware and software capabilities of the handheld device to provide users with an experience beyond that of a dedicated device."
Vendor Highlights
Top Vendors, Worldwide Handheld Device Shipments and Market Share, 2Q 2005 | |||||
| 2Q '05 Ship | 2Q '05 Share | 2Q '04 Ship | 2Q '04 Share | |
1 | Palm | 638,376 | 36.5% | 924,364 | 41.8% |
2 | HP | 321,928 | 18.4% | 530,239 | 24.0% |
3 | Acer | 199,921 | 11.4% | 28,228 | 1.3% |
4 | Dell | 179,200 | 10.2% | 153,000 | 6.9% |
5 | Yakumo | 58,000 | 3.3% | 13,000 | 0.6% |
| Other | 352,448 | 20.1% | 561,029 | 25.4% |
| Total | 1,749,873 | 100.0% | 2,209,860 | 100.0% |
Source: IDC, July 26, 2005 |
Handheld devices are pocket-sized, either pen or keypad-centric, and are capable of synchronizing with desktop or laptop computers.
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