Rise of Smartphones

These days cellular mobile phone is a mobile phone with an advanced mobile operating system and these types of phones are called smartphones. While drilling about the rise of smartphones, we have to go back to early 70’s, when devices with telephony and computing were first conceptualized.

PDA Application

The PDA Devices
Later in 1993 it was offered for sales. Though, it did not yet have general purpose in a wireless device typical of smartphones. The term ‘smart phone’ firstly appeared and printed in 1995, describing AT&T's ‘PhoneWriter Communicator’ as a ‘smart phone’. The first mobile phone to implement PDA features was an IBM prototype developed in 1992 and demonstrated that year at the COMDEX computer industry trade show. A refined version of the product offered to the public in 1994 by BellSouth under the name Simon Personal Communicator. The Simon was the first cellular device that can be properly considered as a "smartphone", although it was not called that in 1994. In addition to its ability to make and receive cellular phone calls, Simon was capable to send and receive faxes and emails and included several other apps like address book, calendar, appointment scheduler, calculator, world time clock, and note pad through its touch screen user interface. 

During the late 90’s, many mobile phone users used to carry a separate dedicated PDA device that powered by early versions of operating systems such as Palm OS, BlackBerry OS or Windows CE/Pocket PC. These operating systems would later ignite the development of mobile operating systems. In 1996, Nokia launched the Nokia 9000 Communicator which combined a PDA based on the GEOS V3.0 operating system from Geoworks with a digital cellular phone based on the Nokia 2110.

Nokia 2110

The two devices were assembled together via a hinge in what became known as a clamshell design. When opened, the display was on the inside top surface and with a physical QWERTY keyboard on the bottom. In June 1999, Qualcomm released a ‘CDMA Digital PCS Smartphone’ with integrated Palm PDA and Internet connectivity, known as the ‘pdQ Smartphone’. In early 2000, the Ericsson R380 arrived in the market, released by Ericsson Mobile Communications, and was the first device marketed as a ‘smartphone'. It was blended with the functions of a mobile phone and a PDA, supported limited web browsing with a resistive touchscreen utilizing a stylus. In early 2001, Palm, Inc. released the Kyocera 6035, which combined a PDA with a mobile phone and operated on Verizon. It also supported limited web browsing. Smartphones prior to the Android, iOS and Blackberry, typically ran on Symbian, which was originally developed by Psion.

Arrival of Android and iPhone

In 2007, Apple Inc. introduced the iPhone, one of the first smartphones to use a multi-touch interface. The iPhone was notable for its use of a large touchscreen for direct finger input as its main means of user interface, instead of a stylus, keyboard, or keypad typical for smartphones at the time. 

iOS 1.3

Somewhere in another corner of the world a mobile operating system much similar to iOS, as today known as Android was already developed. 2008 witnessed the release of the first phone to use Android called the HTC Dream. Although Android's growth was relatively slow at first, it started to gain widespread popularity in 2010, and now dominates the market. These new platforms led to the decline of earlier ones the so called multimedia phones. Lately Microsoft, for instance, developed new OS from scratch, called Windows Phone. Nokia abandoned Symbian and tied-up with Microsoft to use Windows Phone on its smartphones. Windows Phone then became the third-most-popular OS. Palm's webOS was developed by Hewlett-Packard and later sold to LG Electronics for use on LG smart TVs. BlackBerry Limited, formerly known as Research In Motion, also developed a new platform from scratch, BlackBerry 10. The capacitive touchscreen also had a knock-on effect on smartphone form factors. Before 2007 it was common for devices to have a physical numeric keypad or physical QWERTY keyboard in either a candybar or sliding form factor. However, by 2010, there were no top-selling smartphones with physical keypads. And the Rise of the smartphones began.