An In-Stat analyst has clearly got a little too enthusiastic following the delivery of his new iPad and claims that Apple will become the world's second largest mobile processor company behind Intel in this year!

This will be a little tricky given the fact htat Apple does not actually make its own processors, these are mostly done by Samsung, but hell never get in the way of an Apple fanboy when he is moist. In-Stat claims that Apple iPhone and iPad shipments were so big that Apple will likely overtake Intel as the world's largest mobile processor company by the end of this year.

Now comes the figures.  Apple shipped about 176 million processors in devices such as the iPad and iPhone, representing a 13.5 percent market share. Intel took the top spot with 181 million processors shipping in mobile products such as laptops, a 13.9 percent market share. So in case you are interested, to get that figure In-Stat has had to say that laptops count as mobile processors. What is not clear if the figures counted the Intel chips that are in Apple macbooks.

Jim McGregor, chief technology strategist at In-Stat and author of the report said that Apple's continued success of the iPhone and iPad, as well as the stronger growth rates of the smartphone and tablet markets than PCs “will help catch up to Intel”. Intel will no doubt be pleased that In-Stat things it is the world leader in mobile processors, as it is having a hell of a job catching up with ARM.  Apples own designs are based on ARM.

The study counts  mobile processors in portable media players such as Apple's iPod Touch, handheld gaming devices from Nintendo and Sony, and e-readers. However, the study does not count processors in desktops and servers, a market dominated by x86 processors from Intel.