Microsoft: Sales of Windows Phone Quadruple with Windows Phone 8

From X-bit Labs: Sales of smartphones based on Windows Phone operating system have quadrupled compared to the same time last year thanks to the launch of Windows Phone 8 platform. Moreover, in many countries WP8-based handsets from Nokia and HTC are sold out. With strong sales of Windows Phone 8-powered devices, Microsoft may be able to challenge RIM in terms of market share.

“Windows Phone 8 has been on sale for a few weeks and is off to a great start. Handsets made by HTC and Nokia are getting rave reviews and have initially sold out in many countries,” said Steve Ballmer, chief executive officer of Microsoft, at Annual Shareholder Meeting, reports Bloomberg news-agency.

Actual sales of Windows Phone 8-based smartphones are still pretty low, which is why Microsoft does not disclose actual number of devices sold. Nonetheless, the company claims that shipments of Windows Phone 8 smartphones in November ’12 were four times higher compared to sales of Windows Phone 7 phones in November ’11. Provided that shipments of products powered by Windows Phone 8 continue to be strong, Microsoft will be able to significantly boost its smartphone market share.

According to Gartner, sales of Windows Mobile and Windows Phone 7 handsets were 2.759 million units in Q4 2011, which represented 1.9% market share. In case Microsoft and its partners manage to sell 10.8 million WP8-based smartphones in Q4 2012, the company will be able to challenge Research in Motion’s Blackberry platform both in terms of sales as well as market share.

Theoretically, Microsoft Windows Phone 8 may become the No. 3 smartphone operating system already this quarter provided that it leaves RIM’s Blackberry behind. Still, Windows Phone will be considerably behind Google Android and Apple iOS.

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