PDA shipments are up, depending on who you ask

Gartner group says year-to-year PDA shipments are up 2.7% in the second quarter of 2006, but an IDC study over the same period shows a 26.3% decline. That's a huge gap to bridge, but it's all in the method of measurement. Gartner includes two units that IDC doesn't: RIM BlackBerrys and PDAs that have voice-communications. My belief is that a BlackBerry is a PDA as much as a Dell Axim or HP iPAQ, so inclusion makes sense to me. Voice-capable PDAs are by definition PDAs as well. One difference lies in a question that one of our readers, Ed, just asked today: why are some Windows Mobile 5.0 devices called Smartphones?

Personally, I like the Gartner approach as I think it's more representative of the true PDA market. Either way, whether you lump PDAs with phone capabilities into the mix or not, it's clear that the PDA and phone convergence we've watched over the past few years continues to grow. Are the days of the non-phone PDA coming to a close?

-kct

Comments

[Josh Einstein]

IDC's take would be like saying computer sales are way down because they're only counting desktops.

The move to integrated phone/pda devices is a natural evolution. It's the way the market wants to go. It's a good thing.