iPad mini helping Apple grow its lead in mobile ad impressions to third of market

By Kevin Bostic

Apple in 2012 increased its lead over other mobile device manufacturers in terms of mobile ad impressions, leveraging the launch of the iPad mini to grow its share to nearly a third of the overall market, according to a new statistics. 

Millennial Media, the third-largest mobile advertising platform after Apple and Google, released on Friday its 2012 year in review report for the mobile advertising market, which places Apple atop all other manufacturers with 31.2% of all mobile-based ad impressions. That's nearly a five%age point increase over the company's 26.35% share in 2011. 

More specifically, the report illustrates the increasing dominance of Apple and Samsung in the mobile sector. Samsung was second to Apple, with 22.32% of mobile impressions. Together, the two manufacturers combine for control for more than half of all mobile impressions. 

The only other manufacturer with double-digit impression share was BlackBerry, with 11.5%.

Millennial affirmed that Apple's iOS continues to lead among tablet operating systems in the mobile ad space, generating 58% of all ad impressions. However, Android's share in the segment has grown to 41%. Samsung was the overall leader among Android tablet manufacturers, with 45% of ad impressions. Meanwhile, Kindle Fire maker Amazon took second place with 26%. Motorola, Acer, and Asus rounded out the top five Android tablet makers, though none of the three approached a 10% share.