International Journal of Business Management & Research (IJBMR) ISSN 2249-6920 Vol. 3, Issue 4, Oct 2013, 29-40 © TJPRC Pvt. Ltd. THE CONSUMER’S PREFERRED OPERATING SYSTEM: ANDROID OR iOS VINAMRA JAIN & ASHOK SHARMA Department of Marketing, Amity Business School, Amity University, Noida, Uttar Pradesh, India ABSTRACT Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS have been the frontrunners in the Smartphone era that we have been witnessing. Since the past 5 years we have seen revolutionary changes in the usage of mobile phones. Apple with its iPhone series created ripples in the market but in 2007 Android OS launched by Google challenged the dominance of Apple iOS. Further we have seen the smart phone market was fuelled by youth who have preference for innovations. They are the ones who have been downloading various Apps and fuelling the growth of such phones. A comparative study was done keeping this in mind to identify the consumer’s preference towards the two most popular OS. An attempt is made to identify various factors that influence purchase decision between them and lastly to analyse which OS gave user’s more satisfaction. The research carried out in this area helped us know the challenges faced by the marketer for reaching its target audience and the challenges faced by the customer while judging the brand during purchase. KEYWORDS: Android Operating System, Customer Perception, Competition, Apple iOS, Consumer Behaviour, Apple, Google INTRODUCTION India has been witnessing a revolution in the smartphone market. Android and iOS are two major OS who have been fighting out in the market for the big bite. Indian Mobile market has been traditionally dominated by Nokia. But later on with emergence of Smartphones the Nokia got left behind in the race. And it was Blackberry’s and iPhone’s who catches up. All the flimflams and excitement about the costlier iPhone’s and Blackberry’s vanished, after the arrival of the most anticipated, open source mobile operating system, the Google Android, which is fated to turn the industry upside down. Despite the growth and popularity for iPhones and Blackberry’s, it is predicted that, Android will make a history in sales and on acquiring the market share, slicing down the markets of both Symbian’s and iPhone’s. Open Handset Alliance (OHA) a confederation of 50 Telecoms, mobile hardware, and software companies, headed by Google, and was found on 5th of November, 2007. The consortium's goal is deploy, the advanced open standards for mobile devices. Android is an open source mobile OS platform, purely based on the Linux operating system. Android is a software stack for mobile devices that includes an operating system, middleware and key applications launched by Google in 2007 and came as a threat to other leading operating systems like apple iPhone due to which apple had to undergo an extensive research and thus launched apple iPhone 4&4S which has better user interface and more easily downloadable applications. This continuous rivalry is the main area of research which effect consumer buying behaviour while selecting a brand. Apple may have been catching all the headlines with its revolutionary iPhone. But history could remember Google as the company that really turned the mobile phone sector on its head in 2007-08. It came up with first open 30 Vinamra Jain & Ashok Sharma handset alliance operating system – Android. Android entered the market and captured a great market share of 27% in just two years. We cannot deny the fact the apple iPhone is the best marvel ever made in the field of technology. It is very true that other businesses always learned from apple and today apple toughest emerging competition is Android. We would like to carry out research in the area of competitive analysis where in upper middle class and upper class segment of people will be targeted. Table 1: Worldwide Mobile Phone Sales to End Users by Vendor in 1Q13 (Thousands of Units) 1Q13 Market 1Q12 Market Company 1Q13 Units 1Q12 Units Share (%) Share (%) Samsung 100,657.7 23.6 89,284.6 21.1 Nokia 63,215.2 14.8 83,162.5 19.7 Apple 38,331.8 9.0 33,120.5 7.8 LG Electronics 15,615.8 3.7 14,720.4 3.5 ZTE 14,606.6 3.4 17,379.7 4.1 Huawei Technologies 11,114.8 2.6 10,796.1 2.6 TCL Communication 8,515.9 2.0 7,396.6 1.7 Sony Mobile Communications 7,955.5 1.9 7,898.4 1.9 Lenovo 7,778.9 1.8 5,820.6 1.4 Yulong 7,478.8 1.8 3,146.6 0.7 Others 150,550.6 35.4 150,229.40 35.5 Total 425,821.6 100.0 422,955.4 100.0 Source: Gartner (May 2013) In the first quarter of 2013, smartphones accounted for 49.3% of sales of mobile phones worldwide. This is up from 34.8% in the first quarter of 2012, and 44% in the fourth quarter of 2012. On the other hand, sales of feature phones contracted 21.8% in the first quarter of 2013. “Feature phones users across the world are either finding their existing phones good enough or are waiting for smartphones prices to drop further, either way the prospect of longer replacement cycles is certainly not a good news for both vendors and carriers looking to move users forward,” said Mr Gupta. Table 2: Worldwide Smartphone Sales to End Users by Vendor in 1Q13 (Thousands of Units) 1Q13 1Q13 Market 1Q12 1Q12 Market Company Units Share (%) Units Share (%) Samsung 64,740.0 30.8 40,612.8 27.6 Apple 38,331.8 18.2 33,120.5 22.5 LG Electronics 10,080.4 4.8 4,961.4 3.4 Huawei Technologies 9,334.2 4.4 5,269.6 3.6 ZTE 7,883.3 3.8 4,518.9 3.1 Others 79,676.4 37.9 58,537.0 39.8 Total 210,046.1 100.0 147,020.2 100.0 Source: Gartner (May 2013) In the smartphone operating system (OS) market (see Table 3), Android continued to increase its lead, with nearly 50% more Android smartphones in the market than a year ago. “There are two clear leaders in the OS market and Android’s dominance in the OS market is unshakable,” Mr Anshul said. “With new OSs coming to market such as Tizen, Firefox and Jolla we expect some market share to be eroded but not enough to question Android’s volume leadership. The Consumer’s Preferred Operating System: Android or iOS 31 Table 3: Worldwide Smartphone Sales to End Users by Operating System in 1Q13 (Thousands of Units) Operating 1Q13 1Q13 Market 1Q12 1Q12 Market System Units Share (%) Units Share (%) Android 156,186.0 74.4 83,684.4 56.9 iOS 38,331.8 18.2 33,120.5 22.5 BlackBerry 6,218.6 3.0 9,939.3 6.8 Microsoft 5,989.2 2.9 2,722.5 1.9 Bada 1,370.8 0.7 3,843.7 2.6 Symbian 1,349.4 0.6 12,466.9 8.5 Others 600.3 0.3 1,242.9 0.8 Total 210,046.1 100.0 147,020.2 100.0 Source: Gartner (May 2013) What is Android Android is a software stack for mobile devices that includes an operating system, middleware and key applications. Google Inc. purchased the initial developer of the software, Android Inc., in 2005. Android’s mobile operating system is based on the Linus kernel. Google and other members of the open handset alliance collaborated on android’s development and release. The Android Open Source Project (AOSP) is tasked with the maintenance and further development of Android. The Android operating system is the world's best-selling smartphone platform. Android has a large community of developers writing applications ("apps") that extend the functionality of the devices. There are currently over 200,000 apps available for Android. Android market is the online app store run by Google. Developers write primarily in the java language, controlling the device via Google-developed Java libraries. The Android open-source software stack consists of java application running on a Java-based object oriented application framework on top of Java core libraries running on a Dalvik virtual machine featuring JIT compilation. Libraries written in C include the surface manager, Open Core media framework, SQ Lite relational database management system, OpenGL ES 2.0 3D graphics API, Web Kit layout engine, SGL graphics engine, SSL, and Bionic lib. The Android operating system, including the Linux kernel, consists of roughly 12 million lines of code including 3 million lines of XML, 2.8 million lines of C, 2.1 million lines of Java, and 1.75 million lines of C++. The Android operating system is used on Smartphone’s, netbooks, tablets, Google TV, and other devices. Android Market Android Market is an online software store developed by Google for Android devices. An application program ("app") called "Market" is preinstalled on most Android devices and allows users to browse and download apps published by third-party developers, hosted on Android Market. Users can also search for and read detailed information about apps from the Android Market website. Android market is one source for the users to get applications for their devices with ease and provides them with full information on its usage. It is well developed store which categorizes every application for the simplicity of users and to provide them with maximum utility.