Jamie Townsend, an analyst with Town Hall Investment Research, has issued a report that says the Nokia Lumia 900 on AT&T is selling at a run rate of about 1 million units for Q2 2012. What exactly does that mean? Jamie is basically saying that if the Lumia 900 keeps on selling at the same pace that it’s been selling since it launched two weeks ago, then AT&T will manage to sell over 1 million of them by the end of Q2 2012, which is a fancy way of saying the end of June. How did Jamie discover the Lumia 900 run rate? By reading a report from Aapo Markkanen, an analyst with ABI Research, who makes the 1 million in Q2 2012 assumption based on a single data point about the success of a Windows Phone game called Taptitude.
Should we believe Jamie and Aapo? No. Why? Because devices like the Lumia 900 receive a predetermined amount of promotion. Once all those marketing dollars are spent, that’s it. There’s no more. But let’s assume for a second that AT&T does promote the Lumia 900 aggressively for three months straight, will people still buy it now that the $100 credit doesn’t exist anymore? Back when the Lumia 900 first started shipping, there was a software bug discovered whereby the phone would lose the ability to connect to the internet unless it was reset. Nokia fixed the issue in less than a week and said anyone who bought a Lumia 900 from the day it was launched to April 21st (last Saturday) would get $100 for free on their next phone bill. That basically made the Lumia 900 free. It isn’t anymore. And let’s not forget about the HTC One X, launching in less than two weeks, don’t you think that’ll steal some of Nokia’s sales?
Here’s another data point: Assume the 1 million in Q2 2012 figure is right. There are 12 weeks in a quarter. The Lumia 900 started selling during the second week of Q1 2012, so 1 million divided by 11 weeks equals 90,900 units. The Lumia 900 has been on sale for 2 weeks, so that would mean AT&T sold a hair over 180,000 units.
That’s considered great?