If you haven’t seen it yet, there is an updated internet trends presentation on the KPCB website.
IMHO, most interesting is the chart of internet traffic in India (page 16), where mobile is now the predominant internet access method. The infrastructure costs of a wireless vs wired distribution favour wireless. If the relative cost savings are passed on this will promote mobile internet access and increased demand for functionally rich smartphones to facilitate that access. So the observed trend towards mobile access will continue, not just for India but for all countries where wireless is cheaper/easier to access.
And what are the actual mobiles being used? StatCounter has the stats – as per the following chart. Nokia is still very popular as in Africa but using Series 40 phones and the Nokia browser but the chart shows that Android market share is increasing.
Compare this to the results in China, where the predominant mobile OS is Android. And then look at the Android growth in the original KPCB presentation on page 10 – growth is nearly 6 times that of the iPhone! If the unit cost of Android smartphones remains lower than the iPhone, I expect this trend to remain not just for China but for many other geographies which is why the global trend towards Android phones will continue – have a look at StatCounter for the figures. From a software development perspective delivering solutions to many different platforms/operating systems, one more reason to deliver native web apps.
