Apple is unconcerned with NPD's smartphone report

If Apple is losing any sleep over those recent smartphone numbers, it's not showing it. Their official response to the recent news that Android is selling more phones than iPhone OS could adequately be defined as: "meh." Spokeswoman Natalie Harrison says that the survey was "a very limited report," and that Apple is "far outselling Android on a worldwide basis." She goes on to say that "with our new iPhone OS 4.0 software coming this summer, we see no signs of the competition catching up anytime soon." Like I said: "meh."

It's notable that she does use iPod touch numbers in her calculations, and we're not quite sure if those belong in a survey of smartphones. But she does have a point — Android may have won this battle, but Apple is still winning the war, and the fight is far from over. There is an interesting parallel here to OS X and Windows — Apple's OS lives squarely on just a few official devices, while the Android system operates on third-party hardware over any number of platforms. It's certainly possible that Android could win on numbers, even while Apple "wins" on usability and quality. But market share has never been Apple's game, and you can't look at any of the money they've made lately and believe they've done anything but succeed.

[via Engadget]