Apple and Nokia will swap places by 2013

In a week that sees the announcement of another credible smartphone in the Palm Pre and Telstra originated rumours of another Android based iPhone killer from HTC, one research company is predicting Apple will take 40% of the Smartphone Market by 2013. Nokia currently has 40% of the market.

According to a Press Release sent to iPod Observer, Generator Research have just completed a new report that estimates Apple will ship as many as 77 million phones, mainly at the expense of Nokia. Their analysis shows the key driver is that

the iPhone and App Store constitute a vertical platform for the delivery of advanced mobile services.

Back in November in It's more than KISS, I looked at the competitive strengths of the Apple ecosystem and came to the same conclusion.

As Andrew Sheehy from Generator says

Right now, Apple has the best platform and the best-looking forward roadmap

Certainly if you are ready to get into the market, and now is definitely the time to be experimenting with mobile solutions, it is the only viable platform for consumer oriented Apps.