You wouldn’t know it based on all the buzz directed towards and hype coming out of that Cupertino, CA based company that used to be known for selling computers, however, the BlackBerry, not the iPhone, dominates the smartphone industry in the United States and it really isn’t even all that close.

According to ComScore who does monthly surveys of U.S. wireless subscribers over the age of thirteen, 36 million of them own smartphones.  Roughly 15 million of these smart phones just happen to be BlackBerry devices.  That is over 41% marketshare.

Now, this isn’t to say that RIM, with the BlackBerry, is in a race all by itself.  Apple is in a strong number 2 spot with just over 9 million iPhones out there giving them a solid 25% of the market.  What’s more impressive about Apple is that they’ve blown passed all of their competition in less than 3 years and, with the exception of limiting their choice of carrier to just AT&T, I  can’t really find much fault with the way Apple is going about there business as far as the iPhone is concerned.

As well as the iPhone is doing, the good ole BlackBerry is still top dog.  Apple is growing in share by leaps and bounds, but, they aren’t taking it from RIM.  Believe it or not, BlackBerry market share growth has actually outpaced that of the iPhone.  I can’t say that this will always be the case, however, it is clearly the case right now.

With its antiquated OS, minuscule application store, an internet browser so bad that Big Mike or Jim Balsillie obviously just said “expletive that begins with F-It!  Just put something on there and get product out the door”, and everything else everyone says is wrong with the BlackBerry, the BlackBerry is still number one and gaining ground.

I wonder what the landscape will look like if RIM updates their OS, makes it easier for developers to write applications with legs, stay true to their promise to release  a BlackBerry Browser on par with, if not better than Mobile Safari, and do some other really cool $#!+ stuff that we just aren’t thinking of right now?

It should be an interesting Spring…

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