Japanese handset sales drop 20%, Japanese tuning out on advanced features
By Will Park on Wednesday, August 6th, 2008 at 11:58 AM PST In Announcements, DoCoMo, Financial/Corporate News
Japan has long been known as the land where advanced mobile phones pack features that would have the average American dizzy with wonderment. Japanese handset makers have been concentrating on stuffing as much techno-gadgetry in to their dumb-phones in an attempt to woo as many Japanese tech-heads as possible.
But, there’s a problem. Japan has seen handset sales plummet 20% as the island-nation’s largest wireless carrier, NTT DoCoMo (NYSE: DCM), pulls back on handset subsidies. NTT DoCoMo reported a 41% increase in mobile phone profits, which is directly tied to their decision to charge more per handset. So, it’s not all bad news.
But, the Japanese handset market’s reduced consumption of new cellphones could point to an even more pressing issue – feature-phones packed to the gills with, well, features, have become saturated in Japan.
As smaller handset makers dumped R&D resources in to developed the latest and greatest feature phones to attract customers, the market has become so saturated with cellphone choices that Japanese population has been spread thin. So thin, in fact, that few handset manufacturers have been able to capture enough of the Japanese market-base to recoup their R&D costs.
We’re likely to see a significant shake-up in the Japanese handset market. Smaller handset makers may need to combine operations in order to stay alive in an increasingly more competitive market. And, with Samsung and Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) breaking in to the game, Japanese companies are going to be hard pressed to turn a profit.
[Via: MocoNews]
if they wanna get some nice revenues all they got to do is release their awesome phones out of japan !!!!!
Sony ALMOST had it.
The Camera, the music and THE most important feature, gaming WITH a joystick.
The next logical step would be for Sony to have added a JOYPAD,like a directional nintendo pad, positioned at the end of the phone. The Java games were starting to look REAL good ‘Mobil Rally pro’ ‘3D Boxing’ etc.
Add a TV output and you have a GREAT music, camera AND gaming phone.
But…..NOOOOOOOOOO, Sony cocks up up BIG TIME by not making a joypad and, even worse, removing the stick altogether.
The result…….ANOTHER bloody walkman.
Gamers form a MASSIVE base of phone users and Sony screwed them over. For a company that makes Playstations and PSP’s, its unforgivable.
They have themselves to blame for ignoring the gaming market.
They were geting soooo close with the k800, but now they’re lost in the wilderness.