Second study says Symbian is leading device platform

The report said that the Symbian platform has used in just under 56 percent of mobile devices sold worldwide in 2004. In distant second place was Microsoft's Windows mobile platform with 12.7 percent followed closely by Linux with 11.3 percent.

This is the second global market study in two days that affirms Symbian's dominance. A study released Tuesday by U.K. market research firm Canalys said that Symbian's market share was 54.9 percent worldwide in the second quarter of this year.

IDC said it expects Symbian's market share to grow to about 60 percent in 2009 with Microsoft growing to 17.3 percent and Linux growing to 17 percent by the same year. As with the Canalys report, the IDC study notes that the Symbian OS will grow because it is being placed into more mainstream devices.

"This platform (Symbian) will dominate converged mobile device volume for the foreseeable future," Stephen Drake, IDC's program director for mobile software, said in a statement.