iPod maintains 75.6% share of U.S. MP3 player market

According to the NPD Group’s latest report on United States digital music player sales, Apple’s iPod won a 75.6% market share for the second quarter of 2006 – more than 65% higher than its closest competitor, SanDisk, which had a 9.7% share for the quarter. Competitors Creative Labs, Samsung, and Sony all came in at less than half SanDisk’s share, with Creative at 4.3%, Samsung at 2.5% and Sony at 1.9%. NPD analyst Ross Rubin attributed the iPod’s success to advertising, and suggested that the iPod and other dedicated digital music players will continue to maintain competitive against music-ready mobile phones based on their superior capacities, interfaces, integration with music download services, and DRM support. [via Macworld UK]