At Apple, the Platform Is the Engine of Growth - NYTimes.com

Excerpt from an Apple-as-platform snapshot

The company is on a roll, Apple enthusiasts say, and it still holds relatively modest shares of huge markets — less than 20 percent for smartphones, and 4 percent for PC’s globally, for example.

BUT concerns lie ahead. And the biggest may be a platform challenge from Google. The iPhone redefined the smartphone, but handsets using Google’s Android software are fast attracting users and developers. In 2009, some 25 million iPhones were shipped, compared with about 8 million phones running Android. Last year, Android shipments reached 61 million, compared with about 48 million iPhones, estimates Sanford C. Bernstein.

At Apple, the Platform Is the Engine of Growth - NYTimes.com