PDAs, surprise surprise!, are losing ground to smartphone and feature phones.
According to analyst firm Canalys, global mobile device sales grew by 51% in the last quarter of 2004 compared to the year before. While the market for smartphones, or "voice-centric devices", increased by a breathtaking 101%, the market for handhelds (including wireless-enabled devices), so-called "data-centric devices", rose just by 5% for the year.
Nokia is the leader in shipped smartphones (4.9m in the quarter), followed by palmOne, whose combined 1.5m handheld and smart phone shipments meant an 8% overall growth. The reports also notes that growth could have been better if the Treo 650 had been more widely available at the time. Still, palmOne remains the
leading smart phone vendor in North America.
Research in Motion continues to chase HP for the third place, with increase in sales of 249% on last year compared to HP's 1% growth.