gartner

Steve Jobs would have you believe that the post-PC era is here. Market researcher Gartner seems to agree.

At the rollout of the iPad 2 yesterday, the Apple CEO's carefully calculated musings about the post-PC world were meant to sow just enough doubt in consumers' minds that they think twice when buying that second PC. (And he was also careful to couch this as the post-PC era, not the post-Mac era. You can have your cake and eat it too if you're Apple, apparently.)

Maybe Gartner sees this as a self-fulfilling prophesy. Whatever the case, the market research … Read more

A surge in sales turned Android into the second biggest smartphone platform in the world last year, according to a new report from Gartner.

Unit sales of smartphones running Google's mobile OS grew 888.8 percent year over year, from 6.8 million in 2009 to 67.2 million in 2010. In terms of market share, that translates into major shift--from 3.9 percent in 2009 to 22.7 percent in 2010.

Sales received a strong kick in the fourth quarter due to demand for a number of high-end smartphones, including HTC's Evo 4G and Incredible, Samsung's Galaxy S series, … Read more

Three years ago, we didn't know what a mobile app store was. Or how popular the concept would become in a very short period of time.

Since Apple's App Store opened in July 2008, however, mobile app sales have skyrocketed as app stores have popped up everywhere. Is it just a passing trend? Research firm Gartner says no way.

In a forecast of what's to come, Gartner released a study today that says more than 17.7 billion apps will be downloaded in this year alone, up over 100 percent from the 8.2 billion downloaded in … Read more

Analyst firm Gartner today released a forecast of revenue associated with software as a service (SaaS) within the enterprise application software market and it shows that cloud and hosted services are growing at a rapid pace in the enterprise.

For the sake of clarity, Gartner estimates that 75 percent of the current SaaS delivery revenue could be considered a cloud service, and that figure could exceed 90 percent by 2014 as the SaaS model matures and converges with cloud services models.

Gartner forecasts that SaaS revenue will reach $9.2 billion in 2010, up 15.7 percent from 2009 revenue … Read more

Sales of disk storage systems jumped in the third quarter, according to figures released by research firms IDC and Gartner.

Worldwide revenue for external disk storage systems grew 19 percent year over year to a quarterly total of just less than $5.2 billion, IDC said Friday. Gartner put the total for external controller-based disk storage sales at $4.6 billion--a rise of 16 percent--in its report Friday. The third quarter of 2009 saw a decline in storage system sales, giving some bounce to the size of this year's revenue increases. Even so, the rises do reflect a burst … Read more

PC shipments around the world should rise this year and next, according to the latest estimates from Gartner. But the forecast doesn't look as promising as it did a few months ago, largely due to the impact of the iPad and other tablets.

For 2010, computer shipments are expected to hit 352.4 million units, a 14.3 percent rise from 2009. But that estimate is down from Gartner's prior forecast in September in which it was eyeing growth of 17.9 percent for the year.

Continuing that trend, shipments should reach 409 million in 2011, a 15.… Read more

Android captured the second-highest global market share of all smartphone operating systems in the third quarter, according to data released today by Gartner.

Driven by its year-long surge, Google's mobile OS took home a 25.5 percent share of the global market, jumping from just 3.5 percent a year ago. Though still on top, Nokia's Symbian continued to lose ground with a 36.6 chunk of the market, down from 44.6 percent in the year-ago quarter.

Android phones have taken off in part because they can hit different consumer segments, says Gartner. Samsung has done well … Read more

Perhaps Microsoft isn't so stubborn about Windows 7 tablets after all. Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer may have just left himself an out to pave the way for a Windows Phone 7 tablet. The official line is that Microsoft will not offer a Windows Phone 7 tablet.

Ballmer, speaking at the Gartner Symposium today in Orlando, was set up for a rough keynote from the beginning. Gartner set up the interview as a consumer/enterprise dueling banjos sort of thing. Naturally, tablets came up. When asked whether there would be a Windows Phone 7 tablet instead of a Windows 7 … Read more

Apple's iPad will help sales of media tablets around the world hit 19.5 million units this year, according to a Gartner forecast out this week.

Hot consumer demand will also prompt tablet sales to jump 181 percent to 54.8 million units next year, followed by 208 million units by 2014, projects Gartner.

North American consumers will account for 61 percent of tablet sales this year. But as these devices reach out to more of the world, North America's share will drop to 43 percent in four years. This year, tablets with both Wi-Fi and cell (3G) connections will add up to 55 percent of all sales. But by 2014, these dual-connection devices will scoop up 80 percent of all sales.

Gartner defines a media tablet as a slate-type touch-screen device with a lightweight operating system, such as Apple's iOS, Google's Android, HP's WebOS, or Nokia's Meego.

Media tablets will play a part in the business world, though only as companion devices, suggests Gartner. For now, workers are taking tablets on the road for quick access to e-mail, the Web, and a few online business applications. But these devices are often third in line behind notebooks and smartphones. As a result, companies aren't paying for tablets for corporate use--rather employees are buying their own tablets to use at work and home.

Tablets will also become more of a family gadget as well as a personal one. Seen as simpler than full-blown PCs, tablets also appeal to a wider range of people from technophobes to power users. As their prices drop, these devices will become one of several that hang around the house to be shared by the entire family.… Read more