http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/09/03/AR2008090301063.html

Don Reisinger
TechCrunch.com
Wednesday, September 3, 2008; 5:00 AM

Symbian on Tuesday released its second quarter financial data. The
Nokia-owned company said that it bested last year's sales mark with
19.6 million units sold. That may seem high, but over the past six
months, 159 different Symbian OS-based mobile devices hit store
shelves, compared to just a handful from RIM and one from Apple.

The most glaring element of Symbian's release was that it only grew 5
percent over the past year. Considering mobile phone sales grew 12
percent in the second quarter, according to Gartner, and considering
Apple is selling 800,000 units each week, Symbian may be losing its
grip on the market.

But to declare the Symbian OS irrelevant is premature. It still reigns
supreme in OS market share and even with stiff competition from Apple,
RIM, and soon, Google, few companies have the ability to catch Symbian
anytime soon.

That doesn't mean it can't happen, though. Apple has already sold 6
million iPhone 3Gs in the past two months since launch and there's no
sign of it slowing down anytime soon.

In order to see exactly what would need to happen for the iPhone to
overtake Symbian in sales, I considered three scenarios: an annual
iPhone growth rate of 300 percent, 100 percent, and 50 percent. To put
that into perspective, expected iPhone 3G sales for the quarter ending
September 30 this year should be 900 percent higher than last year's
figures for first-generation iPhones, assuming Apple continues to sell
800,000 iPhone 3Gs per week through September.

Scenario 1: 300 percent sales growth

The 300 percent sales-growth scenario is our high estimate, but
considering Apple's growth is 900 percent over the past year, it still
represents a substantial deceleration. In order to derive a date for
when iPhone sales might overtake Symbian sales, I assume Symbian OS
will only grow at 5 percent each quarter, since it is a mature
technology. Then I apply the 300 percent growth rate to Apple's
previous-year sales for each quarter subsequent to Apple's latest.
Based on those calculations, the iPhone would be able to supplant
Symbian as the leader in the space by October of next year when it
sells almost 30 million iPhones compared to Symbian's 26 million.

Scenario 2: 100 percent sales growth

For the second scenario, I used a 100 percent sales-growth estimate.
Maintaining such growth would still be quite a challenge, but once
again, it may not be as outlandish as some may think. In this
estimate, I used the same growth rate for Symbian as in the first
forecast. In this case, the iPhone wouldn't supplant Symbian until the
end of September 2010, when it would sell approximately 38 million
iPhones compared to Symbian's 31 million units.

Scenario 3: 50 percent sales growth

For the last scenario, 50 percent sales growth was used as the
estimate to see when the iPhone could conceivably surpass Symbian OS.
The same growth rate was used for Symbian, but this time 50 percent
year-over-year growth was factored in for the iPhone. Under those
assumptions, the iPhone wouldn't outsell Symbian until the end of
September 2012, when it would sell 48 million iPhones in the quarter,
compared to Symbian's 46 million.

Will the iPhone eventually beat Symbian-powered phones? Nobody really
knows. It might continue to sell at a fast clip and outstrip even the
most aggressive estimates or it may slow down and match last year's
first-gen iPhone figures. But one thing is certain: the Symbian OS is
simply not selling nearly as well as the rest of the industry and the
iPhone 3G is outpacing every other smartphone on the market. Although
Apple is expected to sell at least 40 million iPhone 3Gs over the next
year, even that may be an understatement.

...

All of the above figures fail to consider that Symbian OS sales may
actually decline do to competitive pressure  from more popular, easier
to use products in rapidly increasing demand.
It may be a snowball not even Larry can stop.