Showing posts with label iPhone. Show all posts
Showing posts with label iPhone. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 12, 2012
iPhone Hobbled by High Prices in Japan, Lack of 3G in India
Apple's iPhone may be giving competitors a run for their money in North America but when it comes to three of the biggest telecom markets in Asia — Japan, India and China — the company seems to be coming up lame.
The latest sales figures suggest the Jesus phone is struggling to find new converts in Japan. Not far away in India (the second largest telecom market after China) sales of the device are also lackluster thanks to prices that are pushing seven Benjamins for the entry level 8-GB version. And Apple has yet to finalize a deal with Chinese telecom carrier, China Mobile, to bring the iPhone to the People’s Republic.
A combination of high pricing and a marketing strategy that fails to take into account the needs of local markets has left Apple selling just a few hundred thousand units in countries where millions of other phones are sold every month.
Take India, one of Asia's fastest-growing telecom markets. Between 2006 and 2007, sales of smartphones within the nation grew an estimated 31.4 percent. The data-centric convergence device segment exploded at 89 percent, while voice-centric devices shot up by 26.3 percent. As of July 2008, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India reported total wireless subscribers of about 296 million. About 9.2 million subscribers were added in July alone.
Nokia is the market leader in India but other players like Research In Motion (makers of Ur-smartphone BlackBerry), HTC and Sony Ericsson are gaining traction. But not Apple.
It isn't for lack of interest in the iPhone, says Naveen Mishra, an analyst at IDC India.
Apple's brand and the iPhone's design have captivated Indian consumers but the high cost of the device and the lack of a nationwide 3G network has kept away users from buying the phone.
"The iPhone has a large fan following," says Mishra, "but when it comes to buying the device not a lot of people want to spend that kind of money."
Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced the 3G iPhone with the promise of $199 price tag at which it retails in the United States along with a two-year contract with the service provider.
But in India the device has been priced much higher at 31,000 Rupees ($673) for the 8-GB version and 36,100 Rupees ($785) for the 16-GB model.
The reason for the higher cost? Wireless customers in India flat out refuse to sign legally binding mobile phone contracts. Because they’re not obligated to stick with a service provider, handsets on the subcontinent are always full priced, never subsidized.
The iPhone's limited availability through a contract with just two mobile service operators has cramped sales, says Mishra.
Unlike the United States, India's telecom market is skewed in favor of prepaid users, who comprise at least 70 percent of total cellphone users in the country.
Most cellphone users in India buy their handsets from a retail store and activate it with the carrier of their choice; cellphones are generally sold unlocked.
The iPhone is the exception. It is currently available only on Airtel and Vodafone leaving potential iPhone buyers with limited options. India does not offer number portability and switching carriers means existing users could lose their phone number as they move to a new carrier.
India also does not have the 3G … yet. Analysts expect the first 3G networks in the country to be available mid-2009.
For the iPhone in India, sales are unlikely to pick up unless the service providers slash the price of the device, make it available through retail stores and launch their 3G network, says Mishra.
"There's going to be very limited uptake for the device unless the carriers do one or all of these things," says Mishra.
Despite weak sales, it is unlikely Apple will push for significant price cuts in the country, say analysts. "Apple throughout its family is willing to forgo large market share for profitable market share," says Ezra Gottheil, an analyst with Technology Business Research.
Meanwhile in Japan, Apple has partnered with Softbank, Japan's third-largest mobile service provider to sell the iPhone 3G. After the initial buzz, demand for the iPhone has fallen to a third of what it was as users cringe at the high cost of ownership for the phone and the unavailability of some features, says a report in The Wall Street Journal.
As for China, despite speculation, Apple seems no closer to signing a deal with China Mobile to offer the iPhone 3G in the market.
For Apple, it may be time to take a closer look at its business in Asia. Unless the company can move swiftly to change its strategy, it may find itself locked out of the largest telecom markets of the world.
The latest sales figures suggest the Jesus phone is struggling to find new converts in Japan. Not far away in India (the second largest telecom market after China) sales of the device are also lackluster thanks to prices that are pushing seven Benjamins for the entry level 8-GB version. And Apple has yet to finalize a deal with Chinese telecom carrier, China Mobile, to bring the iPhone to the People’s Republic.
A combination of high pricing and a marketing strategy that fails to take into account the needs of local markets has left Apple selling just a few hundred thousand units in countries where millions of other phones are sold every month.
Take India, one of Asia's fastest-growing telecom markets. Between 2006 and 2007, sales of smartphones within the nation grew an estimated 31.4 percent. The data-centric convergence device segment exploded at 89 percent, while voice-centric devices shot up by 26.3 percent. As of July 2008, the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India reported total wireless subscribers of about 296 million. About 9.2 million subscribers were added in July alone.
Nokia is the market leader in India but other players like Research In Motion (makers of Ur-smartphone BlackBerry), HTC and Sony Ericsson are gaining traction. But not Apple.
It isn't for lack of interest in the iPhone, says Naveen Mishra, an analyst at IDC India.
Apple's brand and the iPhone's design have captivated Indian consumers but the high cost of the device and the lack of a nationwide 3G network has kept away users from buying the phone.
"The iPhone has a large fan following," says Mishra, "but when it comes to buying the device not a lot of people want to spend that kind of money."
Apple CEO Steve Jobs introduced the 3G iPhone with the promise of $199 price tag at which it retails in the United States along with a two-year contract with the service provider.
But in India the device has been priced much higher at 31,000 Rupees ($673) for the 8-GB version and 36,100 Rupees ($785) for the 16-GB model.
The reason for the higher cost? Wireless customers in India flat out refuse to sign legally binding mobile phone contracts. Because they’re not obligated to stick with a service provider, handsets on the subcontinent are always full priced, never subsidized.
The iPhone's limited availability through a contract with just two mobile service operators has cramped sales, says Mishra.
Unlike the United States, India's telecom market is skewed in favor of prepaid users, who comprise at least 70 percent of total cellphone users in the country.
Most cellphone users in India buy their handsets from a retail store and activate it with the carrier of their choice; cellphones are generally sold unlocked.
The iPhone is the exception. It is currently available only on Airtel and Vodafone leaving potential iPhone buyers with limited options. India does not offer number portability and switching carriers means existing users could lose their phone number as they move to a new carrier.
India also does not have the 3G … yet. Analysts expect the first 3G networks in the country to be available mid-2009.
For the iPhone in India, sales are unlikely to pick up unless the service providers slash the price of the device, make it available through retail stores and launch their 3G network, says Mishra.
"There's going to be very limited uptake for the device unless the carriers do one or all of these things," says Mishra.
Despite weak sales, it is unlikely Apple will push for significant price cuts in the country, say analysts. "Apple throughout its family is willing to forgo large market share for profitable market share," says Ezra Gottheil, an analyst with Technology Business Research.
Meanwhile in Japan, Apple has partnered with Softbank, Japan's third-largest mobile service provider to sell the iPhone 3G. After the initial buzz, demand for the iPhone has fallen to a third of what it was as users cringe at the high cost of ownership for the phone and the unavailability of some features, says a report in The Wall Street Journal.
As for China, despite speculation, Apple seems no closer to signing a deal with China Mobile to offer the iPhone 3G in the market.
For Apple, it may be time to take a closer look at its business in Asia. Unless the company can move swiftly to change its strategy, it may find itself locked out of the largest telecom markets of the world.
Thursday, April 26, 2012
iPhone Pushes Mobile Gaming To $5.4 Billion
Apple's smartphone is leading the pack, as developers and mobile gamers are attracted to the App Store and its business model, according to one research firm.
Mobile gaming was once simple games like "Snake" that were meant to kill time, but the market is rapidly becoming a lucrative business. Thanks to smartphones like Apple's iPhone 3G, mobile gaming rose 20% and hit $5.4 billion in 2008, according to a new report from JupiterResearch.
The report said overall game downloads were flat in the U.S. and Western European markets, but volumes rose in developing markets like India and China. While Java-based games saw a steep decline, those volumes were offset by a sharp increase of iPhone game downloads.
"The combination of iPhone and the Apple App Store has galvanized the mobile games industry," said report author Dr. Windsor Holden in a statement.
"Apple has provided an innovative device which enables developers to create smooth, compelling, visually attractive games for the mobile users, together with a business model offering a highly competitive revenue share for developers."
The touch input, robust hardware, and graphics capabilities have given the iPhone an advantage over its rivals on the mobile gaming front. Users of the iPhone also download apps at a higher rate than other phone users, and the platform has drawn high-profile developers like Electronic Arts and Sega.
One of the advantages the iPhone has over its competitors is the tight integration of the App Store. This makes browsing, buying, downloading, and installing games over the air easier than on most rival platforms. Additionally, users with an iTunes account already have a credit card on file, which makes buying games easier than on other platforms. For example, Google's Android Market uses Google Checkout, and Research In Motion will use PayPal for its BlackBerry App World.
The report also said that more than half of games downloaded by 2012 will be funded by advertising. This could drive additional business opportunities for the likes of Medialets, which has a rich media ad platform for iPhone apps.
Read more »
Mobile gaming was once simple games like "Snake" that were meant to kill time, but the market is rapidly becoming a lucrative business. Thanks to smartphones like Apple's iPhone 3G, mobile gaming rose 20% and hit $5.4 billion in 2008, according to a new report from JupiterResearch.
The report said overall game downloads were flat in the U.S. and Western European markets, but volumes rose in developing markets like India and China. While Java-based games saw a steep decline, those volumes were offset by a sharp increase of iPhone game downloads.
"The combination of iPhone and the Apple App Store has galvanized the mobile games industry," said report author Dr. Windsor Holden in a statement.
"Apple has provided an innovative device which enables developers to create smooth, compelling, visually attractive games for the mobile users, together with a business model offering a highly competitive revenue share for developers."
The touch input, robust hardware, and graphics capabilities have given the iPhone an advantage over its rivals on the mobile gaming front. Users of the iPhone also download apps at a higher rate than other phone users, and the platform has drawn high-profile developers like Electronic Arts and Sega.
One of the advantages the iPhone has over its competitors is the tight integration of the App Store. This makes browsing, buying, downloading, and installing games over the air easier than on most rival platforms. Additionally, users with an iTunes account already have a credit card on file, which makes buying games easier than on other platforms. For example, Google's Android Market uses Google Checkout, and Research In Motion will use PayPal for its BlackBerry App World.
The report also said that more than half of games downloaded by 2012 will be funded by advertising. This could drive additional business opportunities for the likes of Medialets, which has a rich media ad platform for iPhone apps.
Tuesday, April 24, 2012
Nokia Sues Apple Over iPhone
The suit claims the iPhone infringes on 10 Nokia patents involving wireless data, speech coding, security, and encryption.Nokia has filed patent infringement litigation against Apple, charging that the iPhone infringes on several Nokia patents.
The litigation, which involves 10 patents, was filed, on Thursday in the Federal District Court in Delaware. The patents at issue, Nokia said, involve GSM, UMTS (3G WCDMA), and wireless LAN standards. “The basic principle in the mobile industry is that those companies who contribute in technology development to establish standards create intellectual property, which others then need to compensate for,” said Ilkka
Rahnasto, Nokia VP of legal and intellectual property, in a statement. “Apple is also expected to follow this principle. By refusing to agree [to] appropriate terms for Nokia’s intellectual property, Apple is attempting to get a free ride on the back of Nokia’s innovation.” Apple did not immediately respond to reports about the Nokia complaint.
The litigation is just the latest in the mobile industry, which has been racked by scores of patent and intellectual property suits. Nokia itself was involved in long and bitter patent litigation with Qualcomm that was settled in July 2008 with Nokia agreeing to make payments to Qualcomm over a 15-year period. That agreement included licenses for GSM features, which appear to constitute a major piece of Nokia’s complaint against Apple.
Nokia pioneered GSM, which has figured in AT&T’s exclusive network deal with the iPhone in the United States. The AT&T network also utilizes UMTS, likewise cited in the Nokia litigation. AT&T was not named by Nokia in the litigation. The Nokia complaint appears to be aimed largely at handset intellectual property, although Nokia didn’t completely spell out the charges in its Thursday press release.
Nokia noted that it has successfully entered into licensing agreements with about 40 companies that include the patents cited in the Apple litigation, adding that it maintains that all Apple iPhones shipped since the smartphone’s debut infringe on Nokia patents that cover wireless data, speech coding, security, and encryption.
Last week Nokia reported its first quarterly loss in years, while Apple reported very favorable earnings and revenue. Nokia leads the world in handset shipments with a 38% market share while Apple, still relatively new to the mobile market, is gaining share at a rapid rate.
Wednesday, April 11, 2012
Nokia fights back for share of smartphone market
Nokia's new music phones lead the assault on rivals
Nokia, the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer, has admitted it was slow to react to the rise of new devices, such as the iPhone, and has launched a major offensive to win back market share from its rivals Apple and Research in Motion, the maker of the BlackBerry email device.
"We have an aggressive plan now," Kai Oistamo, the Finnish company's executive vice-president for mobile phones, said at the Nokia World conference today. "But if you go back a few years, the market changed suddenly and we were not fast enough changing with it."
"To a large extent, that is behind us now and we have got our act together," he added.
The company is hoping to capitalise on its unlimited music service with the launch of three new products today – two revamped devices that use the music service, and a "lite" version of the touchscreen N97. They follow last week's launch of the N900, the first smartphone ever made by Nokia, which uses the open-source Linux operating system, and its first ever laptop, the Nokia 3G netbook.
Analysts immediately greeted the N900 as Nokia's first really compelling device that can compete in the high-end smartphone category now dominated by BlackBerry and the iPhone.
Oistamo said Nokia had already clawed back a share in the smartphone market in the past six months, possibly on the back of the N97. Previously, he said, it had been hit hard by rival products.
Nokia has also beaten rivals to become the first phone manufacturer to announce the launch of a netbook, and hopes to get a head start in that market. While the netbook's retail price is likely to be €575 (£506), the company has a deal with O2 in Germany under which customers can buy the laptop for just €250 if they sign a long-term contract. Similar deals are expected in other European markets. The netbook is to be launched in the fourth quarter, using the new Windows 7 operating system.
At the conference Nokia's chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said the string of product launches in the past week marked a "transformational" moment for Nokia. He said the company would attempt to grab more ground in the smartphone market while continuing to cater to different product categories.
He also stressed the importance of Nokia's expanding services business, which is built around its Ovi suite of mobile music, maps, games and other services and is intended to be the company's answer to iTunes, reiterating the firm's target of reaching 300m active Ovi users before 2012. It currently has 55m.
However, Nokia's Comes With Music service has failed to connect with consumers. Many people are reportedly confused by its marketing, which appears to target serious music fans even though the product is a perfect choice for parents who are worried that their children might be downloading tracks illegally at home.
To inject some sparkle back into the music service, Nokia today launched two new music phones: the X3, which has a slide-out number pad, and the X6 touchscreen phone. Both have more storage capacity than their predecessors, and the X6 is able to play about 35 hours of music before the battery runs out.
The launch of the N97 Mini, which is smaller and less powerful than its predecessor, is aimed at a a wider market: at €450, it is more affordable for the mobile operators, who subsidise the cost of phones in many markets.
Read more »
Nokia, the world's largest mobile phone manufacturer, has admitted it was slow to react to the rise of new devices, such as the iPhone, and has launched a major offensive to win back market share from its rivals Apple and Research in Motion, the maker of the BlackBerry email device.
"We have an aggressive plan now," Kai Oistamo, the Finnish company's executive vice-president for mobile phones, said at the Nokia World conference today. "But if you go back a few years, the market changed suddenly and we were not fast enough changing with it."
"To a large extent, that is behind us now and we have got our act together," he added.
The company is hoping to capitalise on its unlimited music service with the launch of three new products today – two revamped devices that use the music service, and a "lite" version of the touchscreen N97. They follow last week's launch of the N900, the first smartphone ever made by Nokia, which uses the open-source Linux operating system, and its first ever laptop, the Nokia 3G netbook.
Analysts immediately greeted the N900 as Nokia's first really compelling device that can compete in the high-end smartphone category now dominated by BlackBerry and the iPhone.
Oistamo said Nokia had already clawed back a share in the smartphone market in the past six months, possibly on the back of the N97. Previously, he said, it had been hit hard by rival products.
Nokia has also beaten rivals to become the first phone manufacturer to announce the launch of a netbook, and hopes to get a head start in that market. While the netbook's retail price is likely to be €575 (£506), the company has a deal with O2 in Germany under which customers can buy the laptop for just €250 if they sign a long-term contract. Similar deals are expected in other European markets. The netbook is to be launched in the fourth quarter, using the new Windows 7 operating system.
At the conference Nokia's chief executive Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo said the string of product launches in the past week marked a "transformational" moment for Nokia. He said the company would attempt to grab more ground in the smartphone market while continuing to cater to different product categories.
He also stressed the importance of Nokia's expanding services business, which is built around its Ovi suite of mobile music, maps, games and other services and is intended to be the company's answer to iTunes, reiterating the firm's target of reaching 300m active Ovi users before 2012. It currently has 55m.
However, Nokia's Comes With Music service has failed to connect with consumers. Many people are reportedly confused by its marketing, which appears to target serious music fans even though the product is a perfect choice for parents who are worried that their children might be downloading tracks illegally at home.
To inject some sparkle back into the music service, Nokia today launched two new music phones: the X3, which has a slide-out number pad, and the X6 touchscreen phone. Both have more storage capacity than their predecessors, and the X6 is able to play about 35 hours of music before the battery runs out.
The launch of the N97 Mini, which is smaller and less powerful than its predecessor, is aimed at a a wider market: at €450, it is more affordable for the mobile operators, who subsidise the cost of phones in many markets.
Monday, March 19, 2012
Microsoft outsmarted Windows Phone OS rings in the new
The oft-renamed Windows mobile phone platform has never matched the glitz of the iPhone or BlackBerry. But is that about to change?
Among smartphone users, Windows Phone – the handset operating system formerly known as Windows Mobile – tends to not to provoke excitement. This is a space dominated by flashy handsets such as the iPhone, now in its third incarnation – with its OS X operating system also at 3.0 after just two years – and by buzz about new operating systems such as Google's Android and the Palm Pre's WebOS.
Worse, Microsoft has had to play catchup to Apple, Google, Palm and even RIM, introducing an "app store" for Windows Phone after its rivals had done so – and after insisting that nobody was making much money from Apple's iPhone App Store. In January 2007, its chief executive, Steve Ballmer, dismissed the iPhone as "the most expensive phone in the world, and it doesn't appeal to business customers because it doesn't have a keyboard, which makes it not a very good email machine". In fiscal 2008/9, the iPhone sold 20.4m units – compared with an estimated 18m Windows Phone licences. (Microsoft has not given numbers for the year, but has not said they were any higher than 2007-08.)
Call for more style
In short, Windows Phone has an image problem – which has not been altered by rebranding it.
Besides the endless name changes (from PocketPC to Windows Mobile to Phone), the Windows phone platform has been regarded as a dull tool for corporations instead of a strong player in the consumer market, and its user interface has never been much to write home about. Third-party vendors have gone so far as to build their own front ends to hide its perceived ugliness, though offerings such as HTC's Touch-Flo haven't always been an entirely good thing, placing a further burden on the phone's CPU.
Yet Windows Phone is the determined tortoise of the smartphone world, having been around since 1996. Microsoft hopes that its next version – snappily named 6.5 – will end its reputation as a plodding also-ran and spur it to catch up with flashier hares such as the iPhone and HTC Hero.
But is it enough? Roberta Cozza, principal analyst with Gartner, says no. "It's too little, too late. WinMo has been struggling in the consumer market. 6.5 is a small improvement in the look and feel, but it's not comparable with efforts from other vendors."
The irony is that what had seemed like a sure thing – aiming a mobile form of Windows squarely at the business users who had it on their desktops – has turned out to be a mistake.
At its core, the OS offers enterprise solutions such as Office apps and support for Exchange, Microsoft's email and collaboration application. This has made it popular with corporate IT departments; consumers, however, have been less impressed. And the BlackBerry was already there to grab market share.
All this is changing, says James McCarthy, Microsoft's business manager for mobile communications. The next release, probably in September, "pays real attention to the consumer". Certainly, the new look places it much more firmly in the arena with the iPhone and LG Viewty.
The whole interface has had a makeover, aimed at making it much more intuitive and finger-friendly. Until now, using Windows Mobile has tended to require a stylus – fiddly, easy to break and to lose – because the screens on the devices have been small and packed with information.
A lot of care has been taken with the home screen. There's no need to drill down to an application: if it tells you you have an email, you can launch it right away.
Microsoft will also launch a series of related products, from an app store to MyPhone, an online backup service that already works well in beta.
Perhaps the most important thing for any smartphone is the ecosystem that grows up around it. Apple's App Store for the iPhone registered 1.5bn downloads in its first year, and rivals quickly followed: RIM, which makes the BlackBerry, has its App World, Nokia its oddly named Ovi World, and there's the Android Market for handsets running Google's Android. "It's a battle of the ecosystems," says Cozza. "Microsoft needs to come up with a strategy around an application marketplace."
Microsoft had left the apps business to partners such as Handango, but now would argue that it's doing precisely that. With its app store Windows Marketplace for Mobile (it's rubbish at names), it understands that it must offer at least some apps when it launches 6.5. There will be 20,000 available, and McCarthy says "We're busy making sure that they work with the handsets – there's a ton of work going into that."
Consumer challenge
The key question is whether Microsoft can be a big player in the consumer space. The figures suggest it has some catching up to do. According to Gartner, Windows Mobile has a steady 10% or so of the OS market – competing against proprietary Sony Ericsson and Samsung systems, as well as Symbian, which runs on Nokia and some other phones, and the offerings on the BlackBerry, the iPhone, Android and Palm. Its share of the smartphone market has fallen as the iPhone has wormed its way into corporations, by licensing Microsoft Exchange so that it can handle ActiveSync push notifications and calendaring.
However, says US-based analyst Michael Gartenberg, "of course it's not late to the party". He reckons that the new version of Windows Mobile will "have a lot of appeal to consumers" and that it "builds on a solid foundation". Gartenberg, vice-president of strategy and analysis at Interpret, argues that other smartphone manufacturers still cannot match Windows Mobile as a business offering.
With a Windows Mobile phone, he says, you can not only take pictures and keep up with Facebook and Twitter, you can also edit a Microsoft Word document or an Excel spreadsheet and then email it to your colleagues – which you can't (yet) do with an iPhone. Business people who need that are also consumers who want to keep up with their social networks, he notes, adding that Windows Mobile offers the best of both worlds.
Cozza concedes that Windows Mobile is "a strong platform for enterprise", but adds that for a smartphone to succeed, it needs to blur the dividing line between business and consumer users. RIM, with the BlackBerry, has done that smartly, she says.
But, counters Gartenberg, Windows Mobile already does that. What Microsoft needs to do now is to tell the story of its latest version of the system. "There's a lot of negative perception about WinMo," he says, adding that there's everything to play for.
"Six platforms can't survive," he says. "The battle is hardly over yet. "Cozza is more cautious: "We will have to wait and see," she says.
Read more »
Among smartphone users, Windows Phone – the handset operating system formerly known as Windows Mobile – tends to not to provoke excitement. This is a space dominated by flashy handsets such as the iPhone, now in its third incarnation – with its OS X operating system also at 3.0 after just two years – and by buzz about new operating systems such as Google's Android and the Palm Pre's WebOS.
Worse, Microsoft has had to play catchup to Apple, Google, Palm and even RIM, introducing an "app store" for Windows Phone after its rivals had done so – and after insisting that nobody was making much money from Apple's iPhone App Store. In January 2007, its chief executive, Steve Ballmer, dismissed the iPhone as "the most expensive phone in the world, and it doesn't appeal to business customers because it doesn't have a keyboard, which makes it not a very good email machine". In fiscal 2008/9, the iPhone sold 20.4m units – compared with an estimated 18m Windows Phone licences. (Microsoft has not given numbers for the year, but has not said they were any higher than 2007-08.)
Call for more style
In short, Windows Phone has an image problem – which has not been altered by rebranding it.
Besides the endless name changes (from PocketPC to Windows Mobile to Phone), the Windows phone platform has been regarded as a dull tool for corporations instead of a strong player in the consumer market, and its user interface has never been much to write home about. Third-party vendors have gone so far as to build their own front ends to hide its perceived ugliness, though offerings such as HTC's Touch-Flo haven't always been an entirely good thing, placing a further burden on the phone's CPU.
Yet Windows Phone is the determined tortoise of the smartphone world, having been around since 1996. Microsoft hopes that its next version – snappily named 6.5 – will end its reputation as a plodding also-ran and spur it to catch up with flashier hares such as the iPhone and HTC Hero.
But is it enough? Roberta Cozza, principal analyst with Gartner, says no. "It's too little, too late. WinMo has been struggling in the consumer market. 6.5 is a small improvement in the look and feel, but it's not comparable with efforts from other vendors."
The irony is that what had seemed like a sure thing – aiming a mobile form of Windows squarely at the business users who had it on their desktops – has turned out to be a mistake.
At its core, the OS offers enterprise solutions such as Office apps and support for Exchange, Microsoft's email and collaboration application. This has made it popular with corporate IT departments; consumers, however, have been less impressed. And the BlackBerry was already there to grab market share.
All this is changing, says James McCarthy, Microsoft's business manager for mobile communications. The next release, probably in September, "pays real attention to the consumer". Certainly, the new look places it much more firmly in the arena with the iPhone and LG Viewty.
The whole interface has had a makeover, aimed at making it much more intuitive and finger-friendly. Until now, using Windows Mobile has tended to require a stylus – fiddly, easy to break and to lose – because the screens on the devices have been small and packed with information.
A lot of care has been taken with the home screen. There's no need to drill down to an application: if it tells you you have an email, you can launch it right away.
Microsoft will also launch a series of related products, from an app store to MyPhone, an online backup service that already works well in beta.
Perhaps the most important thing for any smartphone is the ecosystem that grows up around it. Apple's App Store for the iPhone registered 1.5bn downloads in its first year, and rivals quickly followed: RIM, which makes the BlackBerry, has its App World, Nokia its oddly named Ovi World, and there's the Android Market for handsets running Google's Android. "It's a battle of the ecosystems," says Cozza. "Microsoft needs to come up with a strategy around an application marketplace."
Microsoft had left the apps business to partners such as Handango, but now would argue that it's doing precisely that. With its app store Windows Marketplace for Mobile (it's rubbish at names), it understands that it must offer at least some apps when it launches 6.5. There will be 20,000 available, and McCarthy says "We're busy making sure that they work with the handsets – there's a ton of work going into that."
Consumer challenge
The key question is whether Microsoft can be a big player in the consumer space. The figures suggest it has some catching up to do. According to Gartner, Windows Mobile has a steady 10% or so of the OS market – competing against proprietary Sony Ericsson and Samsung systems, as well as Symbian, which runs on Nokia and some other phones, and the offerings on the BlackBerry, the iPhone, Android and Palm. Its share of the smartphone market has fallen as the iPhone has wormed its way into corporations, by licensing Microsoft Exchange so that it can handle ActiveSync push notifications and calendaring.
However, says US-based analyst Michael Gartenberg, "of course it's not late to the party". He reckons that the new version of Windows Mobile will "have a lot of appeal to consumers" and that it "builds on a solid foundation". Gartenberg, vice-president of strategy and analysis at Interpret, argues that other smartphone manufacturers still cannot match Windows Mobile as a business offering.
With a Windows Mobile phone, he says, you can not only take pictures and keep up with Facebook and Twitter, you can also edit a Microsoft Word document or an Excel spreadsheet and then email it to your colleagues – which you can't (yet) do with an iPhone. Business people who need that are also consumers who want to keep up with their social networks, he notes, adding that Windows Mobile offers the best of both worlds.
Cozza concedes that Windows Mobile is "a strong platform for enterprise", but adds that for a smartphone to succeed, it needs to blur the dividing line between business and consumer users. RIM, with the BlackBerry, has done that smartly, she says.
But, counters Gartenberg, Windows Mobile already does that. What Microsoft needs to do now is to tell the story of its latest version of the system. "There's a lot of negative perception about WinMo," he says, adding that there's everything to play for.
"Six platforms can't survive," he says. "The battle is hardly over yet. "Cozza is more cautious: "We will have to wait and see," she says.
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Dell Bets on Smartphone Sales in India
Better late than never. That seems to be Dell’s mantra as it seeks to launch its first smartphone in India – the world’s fastest growing and second-largest mobile phone market – to take on the combined Hewlett-Packard-Palm threat it now faces.
“We will launch a smartphone in India later this year,” Steve Felice, president of Dell’s consumer, small and medium business division, said in a post-earnings conference call with Asian journalists Friday.
Dell will also bring more smartphone models to China in addition to the one launched earlier this year, he added.
The move can’t come too soon.
Rival Hewlett-Packard, which leads Dell in overall PC market share globally as well as in India, agreed to buy Palm Inc. in April this year for about $1.2 billion. H-P is expected to use the acquisition to add smartphone market share to its market leadership of worldwide and Indian PC sales.
In India, sales of mobile phones far outnumber personal computers. For every personal computer sold in India, 80 new mobile phones were sold in the calendar year of 2009, according to statistics by research firm IDC India.
Commercial third-generation bandwidth services are expected to roll out in September, which is likely to boost consumption of data services on smartphones.
Finnish handset maker Nokia had the largest share of 54.1% in terms of units sold in India during calendar year 2009 followed by Korean firms Samsung with a 9.7% share and LG with a 6.4% share, a note by IDC India said.
Though no separate numbers on smartphone sales in India were immediately available, the entry of cheap Indian-branded and Chinese-made copies of Nokia, Blackberry and iPhone smartphones may spoil the party for Dell, H-P and other smartphone makers including Apple.
The mobile phone market has got more crowded and fragmented, said IDC India.
“The rise of ‘copycat’ models that have looks and aesthetics resembling those of high-end smartphones which are often available for as little as one-tenth of the average sales value of a smartphone have led to this,” the research firm added.
Also, price-conscious consumers have forced intensely competitive operators to charge a pittance for voice calls, so it is still difficult to sell unlimited data plans, none of which cost less than $20 dollars a month.
Despite this, the need of the average Indian to access information and use services like learning English or booking train tickets on mobile phones should help Dell in its smartphone venture eventually.
“We will launch a smartphone in India later this year,” Steve Felice, president of Dell’s consumer, small and medium business division, said in a post-earnings conference call with Asian journalists Friday.
Dell will also bring more smartphone models to China in addition to the one launched earlier this year, he added.
The move can’t come too soon.
Rival Hewlett-Packard, which leads Dell in overall PC market share globally as well as in India, agreed to buy Palm Inc. in April this year for about $1.2 billion. H-P is expected to use the acquisition to add smartphone market share to its market leadership of worldwide and Indian PC sales.
In India, sales of mobile phones far outnumber personal computers. For every personal computer sold in India, 80 new mobile phones were sold in the calendar year of 2009, according to statistics by research firm IDC India.
Commercial third-generation bandwidth services are expected to roll out in September, which is likely to boost consumption of data services on smartphones.
Finnish handset maker Nokia had the largest share of 54.1% in terms of units sold in India during calendar year 2009 followed by Korean firms Samsung with a 9.7% share and LG with a 6.4% share, a note by IDC India said.
Though no separate numbers on smartphone sales in India were immediately available, the entry of cheap Indian-branded and Chinese-made copies of Nokia, Blackberry and iPhone smartphones may spoil the party for Dell, H-P and other smartphone makers including Apple.
The mobile phone market has got more crowded and fragmented, said IDC India.
“The rise of ‘copycat’ models that have looks and aesthetics resembling those of high-end smartphones which are often available for as little as one-tenth of the average sales value of a smartphone have led to this,” the research firm added.
Also, price-conscious consumers have forced intensely competitive operators to charge a pittance for voice calls, so it is still difficult to sell unlimited data plans, none of which cost less than $20 dollars a month.
Despite this, the need of the average Indian to access information and use services like learning English or booking train tickets on mobile phones should help Dell in its smartphone venture eventually.
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