Small Screens Loom Large

RBC Capital Markets analyst, Mike Abramsky, predicts that by 2011 smartphones will outsell PCs around the world. Abramsky predicts worldwide sales of both types of devices to reach almost 400 million units by 2011. This would mean 400% growth for the smartphone manufacturers, who sold just over 100 million smartphones in 2008.

The rapidly increasing number of web-enabled smartphones makes them an attractive alternative to PCs. Consumers are proving to be more willing to forego upgrading their existing PCs in favor of upgrading to the new generation of mobile devices. Even with the new, lower-priced netbooks increasing in popularity, subsidized smartphones are often more economical, not to mention more portable and personal.