While the mobile OS landscape is quite crowded right now, it might not always be so. Ashok Kumar, an analyst with Rodman & Renshaw, suggests that players such as Microsoft’s Windows Phone, RIM’s BlackBerry OS, Palm’s webOS, Symbian, Maemo (already succeeded by MeeGo) could all lose out to Google Android and Apple iPhone.
Kumar also makes a number of interesting predictions in a research note published this week:
- Apple could end its remaining exclusive carrier relationships with the launch of the fourth generation iPhone (likely to be launched in June.)
- The odds are against Symbian surviving, which could lead Nokia to adopt either Android or Windows Mobile.
- HP’s Palm acquistion will fail without a significant financial investment to increase its market share.
- The upcoming BlackBerry OS will not help RIM gain market share.
- Windows Phone is described as a “wild card,” suggesting that it still has the potential to disrupt all these predictions.
Anyone see anything different in their own crystal balls?