It's looking very bleak for Microsoft's big partnership with Nokia.
After crunching smartphone market data from comScore and Nielsen, Horace Dediu believes Nokia only had 330,000 Lumia smartphones in use over the last four months in the U.S.
If this is accurate, it's devastating for both Microsoft and Nokia. Nokia was betting on the Windows Phone platform to reinvigorate the company. Microsoft, likewise, was betting on Nokia, with it large distribution, and rich heritage of phone making to launch Windows Phone.
Here's how Dediu arrived at his conclusion:
Nielsen’s total Windows base adds up to 4.5% while comScore reckons on 4%. Within that total, Nielsen breaks out 3.2% for Windows Mobile and 1.3% for Windows Phone. Within the Windows Phone total, HTC and Samsung are shown as having 0.5% and Nokia 0.3%.
If we then use comScore’s figure for total smartphone users (110 million) then the data would suggest that there are 330k Lumias in use in the US. This would have been accumulated over a sales period of about four months.
