iPhone in (some parts of) Europe
A while ago, I wrote that iPhone won’t matter in Europe. Now that iPhone has been announced to the three major markets in Europe, without 3G as some were hoping, let’s see what has changed since my original post.
For those who were expecting 3G. What were you expecting? You saw the backslash Apple’s price-cut caused. Can you imagine what would’ve happened if Apple announced a 3G model (with larger capacity) first in Europe, which isn’t even their main market? Now, many people will criticize iPhone for entering Europe without featuring 3G, but these aren’t the people who’re going to buy one. I really don’t believe that 3G is the deal-breaker for anyone who’s really planning to get one. Given that other manufacturer’s can put out phones with 3G and decent battery life, I have hard time believing that to be the top reason why iPhone doesn’t have it as Steve Jobs claims. Then again, telling Europeans that Apple cares more about their US market would not be a good idea.
Do Europeans even care about iPhone? Here’s a nice graph that illustrates one of my points. Symbian, for those who don’t care about smartphones, is the OS which among others, powers all Nokia’s smartphones and not-so-smartphones. The market is different, even though iPhone is not probably aimed at the same market as other smartphones, which is good to keep in mind. I still don’t expect to see major differences in that graph in the future.
Exclusivity to operators means that iPhone will still be a novelty in Europe, especially now that iPod Touch has been released. Even though both Apple and Nokia try to convince us that one device that does it all is the way forward, I will throw out a prediction that iPod Touch plus one’s current cell phone will be a serious alternative to anyone wanting the iPhone experience. Does it make any sense? Let’s see what happens.
In the comments of my original post, I mentioned how Nokia’s original Nokia Club was shot down in flames by the mobile operators. iPhone, of course, does the same through its WLAN iTunes store and Ringtones-thing. Nokia, on the other, hand also believes the time is right for another try and launched Ovi. Conincidentally, UK operator Orange has no Nokia phones in their Christmas line-up. Let’s see how this works out this time. I have no idea how important content services like ringtones are for operators’ bottom lines, but Orange’s apparent retaliation would indicate that it means something.
Another thing, I got my hands on a Nokia E70 and while I got totally frustrated with the complex UI. For example, there are at least three different context menus for any given contact, all with a long list of different commands, depending how deep in the menu tree you’re in the address book. Other than that, I’ve was blown away by the ecosystem of applications available for the phone. Nokia Maps is neat and there’s even putty for the people in need of a SSH client. The internal browser really gives a “true web” experience, but lack of memory cause heavy sites like flickr.com’s and google maps’s non-mobile sites to choke the phone. It’s a solid phone, even though the UI gave me a headache.
For a 1.0 product, iPhone really shows to other manufacturers what’s possible, but I’m still not convinced that it will cause any revolutions. Apple sent a press release that they’ve achieved their 1 million sold by end of September target for iPhone. Apple doesn’t usually tell exact market figures for their products and I’m guessing that unless iPhone does insanely well in Europe we’re not going to hear numbers for Europe, just aggregate numbers when total sales crosses other significant milestones.
My last prediction is that rest of Europe will see iPhone in the same way that iTunes store spread. First the the big three, then others that share common market elemens (iTunes: Euro, iPhone: carrier) and then finally the rest. Given that Finland belongs to the “rest”-category, I’m not expecting iPhone to hit stores here anytime soon.
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About 3G, UMTS and al. : consider those fancy technologies as DOA Dead On Arrival. Ethernet is going to rule the Telecoms World. Hence WiFi and WiMax (and their successors) will be THE unique standard for mobile communications.
So, why worry about the lack of 3G on the iPhone ? As long as I can hook up to a WiFi hotspot somewhere, I’ll be happy. And guess what : there are more and more hotspots everywhere (even in the TGV high-speed train)…
_Marc
Marc, you’re right. WLAN hotspots are almost everywhere. It is also interesting to see how people who would’ve before said that things like UMTS are a failure are now wondering why certain devices do not support it. The mobile operators have spent so insane amounts of money on 3G that they’d be more than happy is some killer-app like iPhone would emerge to use their 3G-networks.
I’m not too hopeful WiMax as it’s been long time coming and might be too little too late when it arrives. I do believe that solution like WiMax would be great, but let’s see what the actual technology will be. One thing is for sure, it won’t be WLAN. One of the problems with WLAN is of course that it tends to use even more battery power than 3G. In many ways, WLAN is a joke and shouldn’t be the technology we use for wider wireless coverage.
It is actually a bit strange to hear more about how everyone is adding WLAN hotspots, but 3G is still a mystery. For example, The Helsinki public transportation is planning to install WLAN into its trams, buses and metros. I guess this tells something about the different adoption rates of 3G and WLAN.
Hi Kari, great post especially after reading the other one you wrote on iPhone first.
I guess it’s very brave from you to resist jumping on the Apple hype bandwagon.
However there still are facts that make the iPhone standing out of the crowd. Check this wire article :
“The iPhone launch was the most successful consumer-electronics launch ever,” says Carl Howe, a consultant with Blackfriars Communications and author of “Analyzing Apple,” an investor report.
According to Howe’s estimates, the iPhone launch made more money than the launch of the Nintendo Wii, Windows 95 or the Xbox 360. (Apple hasn’t released detailed numbers yet .)
Thanks to their $500 and $600 price tags, the 350,000 to 400,000 iPhones Howe estimates Apple sold the first weekend probably earned the company $200 million. ”
******
Regarding WiMax, here is this oher one from Wired.
Cecil, you know, I’ve heard that “most successful launch ever”-thing about iPhone, but without real evidence, I’m having hard time believing it. You know, iPod Nano hit 1 million mark in 17 days. In about three months, Nokia N95 sold “millions” (Nokia doesn’t release detailed numbers).
Of course, it all depends on one’s definition of “launch” (timespan, region, money/units…), but still I’d need real evidence on this before accepting it as a fact and not just as analyst bs.
hmmm … I probably need to read the how to detect bullshit Scott Berkun essay again then.
Could you have been any more wrong here? Iphone is a SMASHING success – yup, in Europe.
; )
Jason, let get back to this after iPhone actually is available in most European countries and not just the few Americans know about.
Still waiting for the God phone to hit the Nokia-country. I’m not holding my breath that it will happen before this post celebrates its first birthday.
Stats, Mr. Bourne, Stats.
[...] iPhone 3G will hit Finland and pretty much everywhere on 11th of July and I wasn’t expecting it before September. Other than that, I still agree with my previous posts about iPhone (before European launch and [...]