Microsoft is aiming to capture 40 percent of the smartphone market with Windows Mobile by the year 2012, an executive said Tuesday.

The target is ambitious considering the company’s relatively small share of the market for smartphone operating systems today and stiff competition from the likes of Symbian, Apple’s iPhone, RIM’s BlackBerry, and newcomers such as Google’s Android platform.

Microsoft’s Windows Mobile OS went into around 11 million handsets in the company’s fiscal year 2007, and it says it will reach nearly 20 million devices in fiscal year 2008, which ends June 30, said Eddie Wu, managing director of Microsoft’s OEM Embedded Devices in Asia, on the sidelines of a news conference in Taipei.

Handsets such as the new HTC Touch Diamond will help Microsoft achieve its goal, he added. High Tech Computer (HTC) is the world’s largest maker of Microsoft-based mobile phones and has been for years due to an early partnership between the companies. The HTC Touch Diamond is a 3G (third generation mobile telecommunications) update to the company’s popular Touch handset launched last year, an iPhone-rival that sports a large touchscreen. Around 118 million smartphones were sold last year, according to market researcher Canalys. Symbian captured 67 percent of the OS market, while Microsoft came in second at 13 percent and RIM took 10 percent.

 

Most domainers buy and own names. They “park” on sites, where they develop content in the form of Web links and ads, to generate income and increase the value of their virtual real estate.

“It’s a long-term investment, like owning a home,” says Lawrence Fischer, vice president of business development at SmartName.com, a company that owns and manages thousands of domain names, including Stockquotes.com. “But if a major brokerage firm came along with a big offer, I would be willing to listen.”

 

Plenty have been willing to pay. Sales of 5,851 domain names generated $29 million in 2007, compared with the sale of 3,813 names for $15 million in 2006, market researcher Zetetic says.

Venture-capital firms, too, are betting on domains. Last year, Highland Capital Partners plunked down more than $20 million on YesDirect, a holding company with 600,000 domain names. YesDirect is developing content for websites using the names, says Bob Davis, a managing general partner at Highland.

Further underscoring the hot domain-name market: Its biggest trade show ever took place in Las Vegas last week. About 400 to 500 domainers and investors took part — double what the same show drew a year ago, organizer Rick Schwartz says. Officials at Yahoo and Google, both of which own domain names, attended. There, the largest live domain-name auction produced $2.1 million in sales in three hours.

 

HOW TO MAX REVENUE, ADD VALUE TO DOMAIN NAMES

1. Purchase a domain name. 2. Build a website based on the name, and establish Web links to related sites. 3. Place ads on your website. 4. Add content. 5. Sell products on site, establishing an e-commerce model.