This marks the third instance in which Terapeak data has been used by the Journal. Last year WSJ called upon Advanced for data support on a Tiger Woods article, as well as in 2009 when it initially asked for input regarding a high-end Dallas clothing store selling its excess merchandise on eBay. Advanced is proud to be a trusted source for accurate and timely pricing information on items sold in secondary markets. Click the above links to view the articles, and consider the limitless applications for Advanced’s data and APIs and how they can be put to work in your business.

Android has finally conquered the smartphone market in the United States. Smartphones running Google’s Android operating system accounted for one-third of all smartphones purchased in the April-June period. Terapeak Market Research confirms this and drills deeper into the smartphone market. The average eBay sale price for an Android phone is $305 dollars and the rate of successful sales is 70%. Compare this to the average price of a Blackberry device, $103 dollars with a successful sales rate of only 33.5%, and it’s easy to see how Android has edged its way to the top. The graph below compares the sales trends of the two brands over a 90 day period.

Terapeak can also provide insight into consumer interest. By examining the top searches on eBay we find that the iPhone is the third most-popular search overall. Despite this high ranking, Apple still lags behind Android and Blackberry in phone sales. But with eBay and every brick and mortar electronics retailer selling premium-priced iPhone accessories by the truckload, and the booming app store, it’s clear that Apple is interested in more than just selling phones.

A quick glance at Terapeak Market Research could have allowed one to predict this news well before it was reported. The chart above lists the top four searches on eBay.com. Apple products occupy three of these coveted spaces and the iPhone holds strong in third amid controversy.

In the midst of what has been called “Antenna-gate,” an antenna malfunction with iPhone 4, Terapeak provides a clear indication that interest in the iPhone isn’t slowing down. As eBay is an ideal sample market to draw insight from, it’s easy to predict a company’s revenues when they hold rank in the top search positions.

A valuable asset to both professional and non-professional eBay sellers, the Terapeak iPhone app allows users to see average prices, listing totals and sell-through rates for each search. Results are viewable and sortable by end price, start price and number of bids, and can be filtered by category, minimum end price and maximum end price. The application is the first and only eBay market research tool available to iPhone users, and is being launched as a holiday gift to all North American subscribers of Terapeak Marketplace Research.

“The iPhone platform has reshaped the face of business, and we’re excited to reward our users with this exciting new tool,” says AERS/Terapeak CEO Fred Speckeen. “eBay, especially, is a massive liquid market, where consumer appetites change more rapidly than anywhere else. Sellers need to be able to run their businesses in real time, based on real data, and that’s a field Terapeak has been specializing in for years. Our research shows that Terapeak users enjoy significantly higher profits than non-Terapeak users, and now, with this iPhone app, that advantage has been mobilized. Terapeak is in the hands of subscribers anytime, anywhere: at garage sales, trade shows, thrift stores, wherever. And these million-dollar opportunities exist each and every day.”

Victoria, BC, Canada

Launching in the UK with Orange on July 10, 2009, the new TG01 will be the world’s first smartphone to be using the new Quantum processor with the dizzying processing speed of 1GHz. Will it succeed in the market? eBay is a common venue for early technology developers, so analysts like Brian Russo from CIBC World Markets use it to predict global consumer trends. Our own experience with eBay data leads us to believe that the level of success in the overall market will be able to be determined by the levels of early online auction activity.

So far, there has been trading activity on the eBay Germany platform for Toshiba TG01 items and accessories. Over half of the shipments of these items have been within Germany itself. None so far have been to the UK or the United States. Have their smartphone markets become saturated while Germany’s still has room for growth?

At this stage it is still too early to tell. In the US leg of the smartphone race we’ve seen Apple’s iPhone leading in sales revenues but RIM maintaining the highest volumes in the USA market- check out our iphone index at http://www.terapeak.com/widgets/indexes/iphone/#graph.

Stay tuned to this blog for future updates on the states of ecommerce sales for the TG01 and its competitors in the smart phone market. For further inquiries or information email us at info@researchadvanced.com.