Gerhard,
I'm sorry but I must disagree with you here....
>It's not the carriers who make that choice!!! it's the consumers!
>they decide what they pay for! You may not know this from your
>UK perspective, but in Japan there are 100s of different phones
>on the market, some only for a short time, for a few weeks. So
>the carriers try out all the possibilities. In the end, the top
>phones have sales figures of several million.
In the UK and other GSM markets customers have a selection (perhaps not
from the carrier shop necessarily) of a handful of phones from a number of
handset makers. In Japan its usually one or two handsets from five or six
handset makers so I cannot see how Japanese users have more choice ....
unless you are talking about cumultative numbers of handsets and not on
sale at any one moment.
Also I do not agree with you here:
>The customers decide: no carrier, no committee, no government.
>If 2 million customers put good money on the table to get a
>2 million pixel phone, the carriers oblige, as simple as that.
You give the consumer too much credit. In many cases what the consumer asks
for is dictated by the carrier's marketing. The consumer just wants the
latest and coolest handset. What latest and coolest means at any one time
is dictated by the carriers and by what they are promoting. Sure, sometimes
new features fall flat on their face but that's not normally the case.
Consider the adoption of CDMA2000 1x by Au subscribers? Do you think
millions of users demanded 144k bps data transmission and bought their
phones because of that feature? No, they bought them because Au gave them
no choice by putting the technology into all of their latest handsets, and
now into all handsets I believe. I realize that perhaps other functions,
such as sending pictures, benefit from the higher data speed but I don't
think users were so dissatisfied that they were demanding change.
The carriers play by far the biggest role in deciding what becomes
successful. If that wasn't the case then we'd have 3-megapixel cellphones
out there now. The technology is there but by moving from 1-megapixel
directly to 3-megapixel the carriers miss an upgrade cycle and lose sales.
Each new series of cellphones only adds one or two functions, when in
reality a few more could be added, because new technology is carefully
timed to maintain the upgrade cycle.
Well, that's my opinion anyway. Make of it what you will!
Cheers,
Martyn
Gerhard Fasol
<fasol@eurotechno To: keitai-l@appelsiini.net
logy.com> cc: (bcc: Martyn Williams/NEWS SERVICE/IDG)
Subject: (keitai-l) Re: keitais killing digital consumer cameras (Ore more) softly
12/24/2003 01:12
Please respond to
keitai-l
Tom
>>Because an average pre-pay user in Europe spends about US$ 10/month,
>>while an average mobile user in Japan spends about US$ 70-80/month,
>>and some a lot more than that.
>
> Comparing low-spending (i.e. prepay) European users to average-spending
> Japanese users doesn't seem to be entirely fair (UK ARPU averaged at
> $40 early this year iirc), but I get your point - thanks.
still 1/2 as much as in Japan. There is a saying: you get what you
pay for! In Japan the competition between DoCoMo, AU and Vodafone and
others is ferocious so you can expect that all are pretty efficient.
So you can't expect the same kind of overall services for 1/2 the
price in UK: who should pay the other half?
>>So DoCoMo and KDDI and Vodafone (in Japan) have a lot more money in
>>the kitty per user to subsidize nice handsets - especially for those
>>users with high billing.
>
> But these high billing users aren't unique to Japan, are they? And
> given that Japanese telcos have this pot of money from which they can
> subsidise advanced handset features, why choose to spend this on better
> quality cameras instead of other features, like faster processors for
> gaming, better video support, etc.?
It's not the carriers who make that choice!!! it's the consumers!
they decide what they pay for! You may not know this from your
UK perspective, but in Japan there are 100s of different phones
on the market, some only for a short time, for a few weeks. So
the carriers try out all the possibilities. In the end, the top
phones have sales figures of several million.
The customers decide: no carrier, no committee, no government.
If 2 million customers put good money on the table to get a
2 million pixel phone, the carriers oblige, as simple as that.
Regarding the faster gaming, better video support etc.
They do that as well!
It's not cameras or games and video!
It's cameras AND games and video!
> Particularly when these better
> quality cameraphones, some of which can't even transmit photos over
> mobile networks, don't generate any revenue for the network themselves?
That's a narrow minded view point. The business models are more
complex than that.
Gerhard
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Gerhard Fasol, PhD Eurotechnology Japan K. K.
fasol_at_eurotechnology.com http://www.eurotechnology.com/
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Received on Wed Dec 24 02:26:24 2003