The Gartner research group (www.gartner.com) predicts that by 2013 mobile phones will overtake personal computers as as the most common Web access device worldwide and that by 2015 over 80% of the handsets sold in mature markets will be smartphones.

However, only 20%of those handsets are likely to be Windows phones. By 2015 media tablet shipments will reach around 50% of laptop shipments and Windows 8 will likely be in third place behind Google’s Android and Apple iOS operating systems.

Consumerization will mean enterprises won't be able to force users to give up their iPads or prevent the use of Windows 8 to the extent consumers adopt consumer targeted Windows 8 devices, says Gartner. Enterprises will need to support a greater variety of form factors reducing the ability to standardize PC and tablet hardware, they add.

"The implications for IT is that the era of PC dominance with Windows as the single platform will be replaced with a post-PC era where Windows is just one of a variety of environments IT will need to support," says Gartner.