Handheld market share falls 40% over last year

We have seen studies showing a rise in the sales of converged/smartphone devices. If you are a mobile enthusiast like me then you also know it is getting harder and harder to find devices that do not have any telephony functionality integrated. According to a recent IDC study handheld shipments are down 40% compared to the same quarter last year. It doesn't help that Dell hasn't come out with a new device to replace the X51v and now that they are completely out of the handheld market I imagine these numbers will fall even further in the future. Add to this the fact that Sharp is no longer making Zaurus devices and 2 of the top 5 vendors in the list are moving out of the market completely. This leaves the leader Palm, HP, and Mio left to carry the handheld market. Palm hasn't introduced a handheld since late 2005 with the Z22 and Tx and there are no substantial rumors of any new devices coming from Palm. HP keeps rolling out devices, but they also recently stated they would not be providing Windows Mobile 6 updates so that could hurt their sales. Mio is moving up as they continue to release devices targeted at the GPS market.

I think there may be a market for dedicated handhelds in the enterprise market where data is collected in mobile forms, GPS is important, and cellular connectivity isn't needed, but I think we will continue to see this market shrink in comparison to the converged market. Palm Addicts provided the link to the report.