Apple’s quarterly results hinted at hefty growth in Japan, and to corroborate, the MM Research Institute has established that there are 2.34 million iPhones in Japan, constituting 72.2% smartphone market share. If these numbers are true, iPhone’s 2009 growth in Japan is double that of last year. HTC, the runner-up, nabbed only 11.1%, followed by Toshiba at 6.8%, and RIM and Sony Ericsson tied at 4.3%.
These numbers surprise me a little bit, since I was under the impression that resistive touchscreens and styluses made for ideal character recognition in Japan and China, which was a big problem for keyboard-based devices like BlackBerrys and devices with capacitive screens like the iPhone. In any case, within the overall mobile marketshare, Apple held less than 5.5%, and considering how mind-blowing Japan’s feature phones are, I have a feeling the iPhone will have a harder time competing at the lower-end.
[via Electronista]