Symbian Smartphone Sales Increase 200%, Vendor ClaimsSymbian Smartphone Sales Increase 200%, Vendor Claims

The U.K.'s Symbian Limited said Thursday that shipments of smartphones based on its platform increased by more than 200 percent in the last quarter compared to the same quarter a year ago.

Overall, the company said in a statement that it shipped 11.45 million devices based on the Symbian OS in the year ending on September 30. That represents well over half of the total number of phones based on the platform that have ever been shipped. The company said that, by the end of the quarter, 38 devices using its platform had been developed by 10 licensees and were being sold by more than 200 network operators.

The company also said that the number of third-party applications available for the platform almost doubled to 3254 available apps in the quarter compared to 1723 a year ago.

Symbian is battling Microsoft and PalmSource in the mobile device platform arena. Market studies have indicated that Symbian, which is co-owned by high-visibility handset vendors such as Nokia and Sony Ericsson, has a strong worldwide lead while the Palm OS leads in the U.S., where palmOne's Treo is popular.