The quarterly mobile phone market research report from Gartner also goes into the progress of the smartphone operating system market and it reveals which one continues to be top dog.

And it remains the Symbian operating system, although its share of the market dropped just over 5% to nearly 47% in 2009.

A Gartner spokesperson said:
“Symbian had become uncompetitive in recent years, but its market share, particularly on Nokia devices, is still strong. If Symbian can use this momentum, it could return to positive growth.”

Breathing down the neck of the Symbian operating system is of course the real powerhouses behind smartphones: Research in Motion’s operating system (which drives the BlackBerrys) and the iPhone operating system. These two gained ground in 2009, with an increase to 20% from 16% for Research In Motion and 8% to 14% for iPhone.

The other slight concern for the Symbian operating system – which is now fully open source - is that it is affected by the weakness of Nokia in the high-end smartphone market.

But things could improve with the impending release of Symbian3, announced at the recent Mobile World Congress 2010, and Symbian4 which will follow shortly afterwards.

The unloved Microsoft Windows Mobile lost market share, falling from nearly 12% to just below 9%. It remains to be seen how the latest reincarnation of the generally unpopular operating system will fair in 2010.

Perhaps not surprisingly, the new kid on the block, the Android operating system, rose nicely from 0.5% to nearly 4%. With it gaining popularity, it will be bound to stay on that sort of course throughout 2010.

The Gartner spokesperson added:
“Looking back at the announcements during Mobile World Congress 2010, we can expect 2010 to retain a strong focus around operating systems, services and applications while hardware takes a back seat. Sales will return to low-double-digit growth, but competition will continue to put a strain on vendors’ margins.”

Tags: iPhone, Nokia, Research in Motion, Smartphones

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