By 2012, Every Third Smartphone Will Run On Linux

[CadCrazy]

Friday, August 31, 2007: According to a study by ABI Research, over the next five years, Linux is expected to be the fastest growing Smartphone OS with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) in excess of 75 per cent. ABI Research forecasts the Linux-based OS to account for nearly 31 per cent of all smart devices in the market by 2012 — representing more than 331 million cumulative shipments over the same period.
Stuart Carlaw, director, ABI Research, said, “Serious initiatives from the likes of Intel and Access are gathering pace and momentum, while the carrier community continues to identify Linux as one of the few operating systems that it intends to support in its long-term plans.”

Carlaw adds, “Linux is benefiting from growing support in the handset OEM community, most notably Motorola, but also Nokia with less traditional types of devices aimed at mobile broadband applications.” The rise of mobile broadband and the impact that this has upon device convergence and format plays into the hands of Linux.

The vertical and horizontal fragmentation that has plagued this market continues to be a concern; however, the recent patent infringement assertion from Microsoft — that Linux, in its generic form, infringes upon 235 of its patents — is an ongoing concern. Many Linux pundits point to this as being old hat, while others indicate that there is no smoke without fire, reveals the study.

The ABI Research study, titled Mobile Linux, found that there are several challenges still facing the proliferation of Linux in this environment. The study explores these barriers, provides a frank SWOT analysis of the mobile Linux offering and supplies forecasts for Linux uptake in mobile devices for commercial OS implementations and RTOS replacement.

Source

 

[gxsaurav]

I question the basis of this study. There is no standard Linux for Mobile Phones out there right now. Motorola has there own, Intel has there own. There is no inter working between these 2. No JAVA apps support so far, no standard & unified one size fit all API for the different Mobile Linux OS these manufacturers use. How they hell they are claiming Linux to take over?

If there is a dominant Smartphone OS out there, then its Symbian OS & then Windows Mobile for Pocket PC, right now Linux is no where & there is no sign of unification. OpenMOKO is there, but its taking tooo much time to develop.

 

[dd_wingrider]

My friends are working on a linux OS for mobile phones gonna release it in next year or so, here is the company link they are working in Celunite

 

[gxsaurav]

^^^^ gr8, another Mobile Linux which is not compatible with any other Mobile Linux out there.

This is the problem about which I m talking about. There is no unification in Linux, no standard, no one size fits all approch

 

[nish_higher]

symbian/windows mobile is great to use.i'm never gonna shift to linux

 

[a_k_s_h_a_y]

actually now in engineering colleges if students are encouraged to use linux and code for linux..then windows is doomed...

coz we the linux users will spread linux....also use linux in office etc..

 

[Cyrus_the_virus]

haha, some noob digged up this old thread to reveal something interesting.

The above pundits who predicted this was nonsense I guess can now shut up thanks to Android

 

[gxsaurav]

^^^ When pundits say, they do not keep only a niche market in mind. We talk about global market where Symbian & Windows Mobile are widely available compared to Android. Also, android has only 3 4 phones available yet while the options r vast with Symbian & WinMo.

Read what I wrote at that time, there was no unified Linux OS for phone. I stand correct today to, other then Android, all else r dead. OpenMoko & LiMo included.

 

[eminemence]

^^^ When pundits say, they do not keep only a niche market in mind. We talk about global market where Symbian & Windows Mobile are widely available compared to Android. Also, android has only 3 4 phones available yet while the options r vast with Symbian & WinMo.

Read what I wrote at that time, there was no unified Linux OS for phone. I stand correct today to, other then Android, all else r dead. OpenMoko & LiMo included.

Have seen this kind of hype in 2004/5 as well, but nothing changed after that. Now all the dev manufacturers have invested in Linux to save some bucks, but once they notice its apparent flaw w.r.t bare support for h/w, all the current support will eventually evaporate.

 

[din]

offtopic

WOW GX is back in TDF to continue on a thread that was started on 2007 ?

 

[Anorion]

lol. Mebbe older threads need to be bumped more regularly. Am surprised at the lack of incompatible operating systems, especially for the mobile platform. Would be great to see hundreds of these.

 

[Mr.R]

oh great then...

 

[thewisecrab]

For once, this is a good bump.

I mean compared to 2007, there has been a world of improvement in Linux-based mobile systems. Nice to see conflicting opinions the and now

 

[gxsaurav]

@din,

I was bored & saw the reply directed at me, I hardly visit digit forum these days after all else from my time grew up

 

[infra_red_dude]

Read what I wrote at that time, there was no unified Linux OS for phone.

...and there will never be a "unified Linux OS". The reason why manufacturers chose Linux-based OS' was for customization. When you say Linux you don't refer to the OS, you refer to the kernel. Android is very much different from OpenMoko though at the core they have the same Linux kernel (albeit different versions).

I stand correct today to, other then Android, all else r dead. OpenMoko & LiMo included.

The study predicted that one in three smartphones would run Linux. It never said one flavor of Linux because it is impossible to predict that. Anybody can take the Linux kernel and build an OS out of it.

Also, android has only 3 4 phones available yet while the options r vast with Symbian & WinMo.

Your data is obsolete, Sir. There are scores of models out there and 100s more in the pipeline, to be released in the coming months!

^^^ When pundits say, they do not keep only a niche market in mind. We talk about global market where Symbian & Windows Mobile are widely available compared to Android.

On a lighter note, it's nice to see that you consider yourself a pundit! hehe...

Have seen this kind of hype in 2004/5 as well, but nothing changed after that. Now all the dev manufacturers have invested in Linux to save some bucks, but once they notice its apparent flaw w.r.t bare support for h/w, all the current support will eventually evaporate.

When Google touches something, it makes every head turn (whether the product is worth it or not!). But HTC should be applauded for their SenseUI which inspired Google to revamp interface in Android 2.x. Until Android is free, WinMo will have a tough competition. Nobody would want Symbian now, since Android has it sources freely available while the former is still in the transition to OpenSource. Also companies will get thousands of engineers who know Linux as compared to only a handful who know Symbian internals. Why would a company want to go with Symbian? It doesn't make sense. Had Symbian been fully open-sourced a couple of years ago then it would've been a strong contender but now its too late.

 

[MetalheadGautham]

I fully agree with anirudhji.

But for me, most interesting android devices are yet to be seen. Obviously HTC is numero uno android adopter. But the best is yet to come methinks.

Motorolla Droid made a surprise entry as an uber gadget.

Now Dell is gonna bring out an Android 2 device and this is rumored to be perhaps made on tegra platform.

Then there are talks about enabling dual booting android with winmo phones. I mean THIS is so really awesome, it brings back fond memories of dual booting Windows XP and Ubuntu back at home desktops.

Nokia is gonna choose mameo as platform of choice from 2012 me hears. But since this is based on conventional debian linux for arm architecture, it will have apps ready made already. Just look at the debian ARM repository. Obviously nothing compared to x86_64 but still... anyway, being similar OS, I'm sure we can run android on mameo devices and vice versa. Hackers are DEFINITELY gonna find a way.

At the end of the day, I feel Windows Mobile and Android/Mameo will emerge victorious. Symbian will be gradually phased out to lower end models and then will disappear once android appears on sub-10k phones. Going by that, I'm sure the every third smartphone sold on 2012 will run on linux can be true. The remaining 2/3rd is still left for Windows Mobile, Symbian and Apple and this is indeed possible.

 

[infra_red_dude]

Btw, these are the latest stats from North American region: *www.engadget.com/2009/12/17/comscore-iphone-overtakes-windows-mobile-use-for-the-first-time/

Symbian is almost dead and Google will just overtake it!