According to research firm Canalys, Google's Android platform continues to dominate the worldwide mobile marketplace as the OS powered 59.5 percent of the nearly 310 million smart mobile devices shipped in the first quarter, while Apple managed to grow its iOS and OS X presence to a 19.3 percent share.
In a report on Thursday, Canalys (via ZDNet) estimated that "smart mobile device" shipments, comprised of smartphones, tablets and laptops, grew to 308.7 million units by the end of quarter one, a 37.4 percent increase from the year ago period.
Source: Canalys
Out of the three device classes, tablets exhibited the strongest growth with a 106.1 percent year-on-year increase to 41.9 million shipped units. Apple led the way with a 46.4 percent share of the global market, though Android ate at the iPad's chunk of the pie for the third straight quarter.
Smartphone shipments hit 216.3 million units representing growth of 47.9 percent. Android accounted for 75.6 percent of units shipped, with Samsung showing growth of 64.3 percent to end the quarter with a 32 percent marketshare. Apple grew its share 6.7 percent year-over-year, the slowest growth rate since the original iPhone launched in 2007.
"Despite its slowing growth, Apple still shipped over 37 million iPhones," said Canalys Principal Analyst Pete Cunningham. ‘But HTC and Samsung have raised the bar with their latest handsets and Apple needs to respond with its next iPhone."
Due to Canalys' methodology, Microsoft came in behind Android and Apple with a 19.3 percent share of the "smart mobile device" market thanks to its huge influence in the notebook PC segment. The notebook market saw 50.5 million shipped units, a contraction of 13.1 percent from 2012.