Sign of the times
Online marketplace eBay has announced that sales via its mobile apps tripled to almost $2 billion last year.
What's more the UK has been the fastest adopter of m-commerce for eBay, boasting more mobile shoppers than any other European country, and buying something through the app every two seconds.
"It's staggering to think that $2 billion worth of sales has been generated through a platform that didn't exist a couple of years ago, and on a device that didn't exist three years ago," said Clare Gilmartin, VP of eBay Europe.
She's referring to Apple's iPhone, of course, and that device leads the way for eBay, but maybe not for much longer.
The latest comScore figures on the US smartphone market show Android overtaking iOS to become the second most popular smartphone OS behind BlackBerry.
Top Smartphone Platforms |
|||
|
Share (%) of Smartphone Subscribers |
||
Aug-10 |
Nov-10 |
Point Change |
|
Total Smartphone Subscribers |
100.0% |
100.0% |
N/A |
RIM |
37.6% |
33.5% |
-4.1 |
|
19.6% |
26.0% |
6.4 |
Apple |
24.2% |
25.0% |
0.8 |
Microsoft |
10.8% |
9.0% |
-1.8 |
Palm |
4.6% |
3.9% |
-0.7 |