Most of the attention surrounding the news that sales of Samsung's Galaxy S were about to hit 10 million units focused on the positives, comparing its ascent to that of iPhone.

Mobile industry advisory firm Asymco, however, has decided to take a closer look at the figures – specifically how they relate to Android's overall daily activation rate.

In Horace Dediu's view, the numbers suggest there are certain markets where OEMs such as Samsung have little presence.

Out of Asia

"If we believe that Android is activated at the rate of 300,000 units per day, then Samsung represents around 40,000 of that - 10 million over seven months, linear extrapolation," Dediu says on the firm's blog.

"So where are those remaining 260,000 units per day going? Gartner calculated that in Q3 Samsung was the leading Android brand - about one third of all units. The Samsung figures make these share numbers very obsolete because 40,000/300,000 is only 13.3 percent."

Dediu deduces that to hit Google's fabled activation rate, around two thirds of all handsets must be sold in Asia. The problem there is, Samsung allocates only 1.5 million of its sales to such territories, placing a big, fat question mark over just who is dominating the Asian market.

"Since neither LG nor Sony Ericsson or Motorola, which have low volumes, are supplying the Asian Android market, the question is' who is?" he continues.

"Only HTC remains a contender but it’s not big enough to account for the difference and they too are focused on the established Western markets."

Small players

As a result, Dediu claims that some of the 277 other Android models – including handsets from the likes of ZTE, Huawei, Acer, Notion Ink, Linx, TMN, FirsOne, Ziss, Kogan, Highscreen, Saygus, Haier and Forsa – must, between them, have the Asian market sown up.

"If there is a worry it is perhaps that Samsung might find it hard to maintain the top spot in supplying Android once the unbranded vendors make it through the distribution obstacle course," Dediu concludes.

"If one is to argue that Android empowers the desperate incumbents, then one has to also agree that it also empowers the more nimble entrants – inevitably leading to even more desperation."

[source: Asymco]