iPhone Claims 46% of Japanese Smartphone Market

[nagromme]

It MUST be the slick-looking emoji (Remember when the iPhone was “doomed” for lack of emoji?) Even I like the emoji, and I don’t know why the heck you’d ever need to text someone an icon for a hot spring or a camel. I mean, “camel” is just 5 letters, and for frequent users, “CML" is probably sufficient.

I also recall the iPhone being “doomed” in Japan due to not having a ring for hanging little toys. So—I guess case manufacturers must have come to the rescue. (Or maybe it’s just a great pocket computer.)

As for defining smartphones as something most people don’t use—well, by any likely definition, most people in ANY country don’t (yet) use a smartphone. But that doesn’t mean the smartphone segment isn’t important: it’s rapidly growing and allows competition in ways that plain old phones don’t.

 

[kdarling]

Sources in Japan say that the iPhone user base in Japan now stands at 3 million, which is an impressive 10% of the global userbase.

Interesting. A few months ago in July, the iPhone user base in Japan was only around 500K.

Who is this "source" that says 3 million now? Well, according to the article, it was this twitter , that says:

Japan's No. 1 Apple expert @nobi estimates there are around 3 million iPhones in Japan (=10% of global total). #smtg

Can someone help us understand who this source is? Is Nobi the journalist named Nobuyuki Hayashi, who writes about Apple a lot?

Also, doesn't Softbank only have 19 million GSM subsribers? If so, 3 million is over 15% customer take up, a ratio that only AT&T customers come close to. (Most countries are much less.)

 

[KnightWRX]

As for defining smartphones as something most people don’t use—well, by any likely definition, most people in ANY country don’t (yet) use a smartphone. But that doesn’t mean the smartphone segment isn’t important: it’s rapidly growing and allows competition in ways that plain old phones don’t.

Except in Japan (and even here) where most phones fit the smartphone definition (Web, E-mail, Apps) but don't fit in the category because they don't have a named OS (Blackberry, Symbian, iPhone OS, WebOS...). My old SE phone could do everything an iPhone could do and had a flash for the camera making it better at taking pictures in darker places and at night. Not to mention it had a memory card slot to upgrade storage. All of that a year of the iPhone release. It wasn't even the highest end model.

But it's not a "smartphone" in these reports.

This report is disingenious. Inflated numbers in a very targetted segment to make it look like the iPhone is a bigger success than it is. This doesn't help iPhone adoption at all, it only makes the analysts writing the report look like fools.

 

[koobcamuk]

... That's because no one in Japan uses a smartphone.
Regular phones in Japan are powerful enough.. they have TVs and stuff on their phones.

I'm glad someone else has said this.

It'll probably be overlooked - but what other "smartphones" are they in Japan? All Japanese phones have push email. Almost all have 5MP cameras and above. Almost all have built in TV...

This % is biased and like 95% of statistics, is completely meaningless.

 

[koobcamuk]

It MUST be the slick-looking emoji (Remember when the iPhone was “doomed” for lack of emoji?) Even I like the emoji, and I don’t know why the heck you’d ever need to text someone an icon for a hot spring or a camel. I mean, “camel” is just 5 letters, and for frequent users, “CML" is probably sufficient.

I also recall the iPhone being “doomed” in Japan due to not having a ring for hanging little toys. So—I guess case manufacturers must have come to the rescue. (Or maybe it’s just a great pocket computer.)

As for defining smartphones as something most people don’t use—well, by any likely definition, most people in ANY country don’t (yet) use a smartphone. But that doesn’t mean the smartphone segment isn’t important: it’s rapidly growing and allows competition in ways that plain old phones don’t.

a) it now has emoji but was a huge issue when it came out.
b) almost all users use cases
c) Most phones in Japan are 'smartphones' but not by our branded standards.

 

[Silencio]

This report is disingenious. Inflated numbers in a very targetted segment to make it look like the iPhone is a bigger success than it is. This doesn't help iPhone adoption at all, it only makes the analysts writing the report look like fools.

We can overlook the percentage since we have an absolute number of iPhones sold in Japan to work with here. 3 million iPhones sold in Japan is pretty impressive, considering all the so-called experts have said that Apple had no chance to succeed in that market.

At least it looks like Apple won't be sent home with their tail between their legs, which is what happened to Nokia when they tried to compete in that market.

 

[Ted13]

My old SE phone could do everything an iPhone could do and had a flash for the camera making it better at taking pictures in darker places and at night. Not to mention it had a memory card slot to upgrade storage. All of that a year of the iPhone release. It wasn't even the highest end model.

"Everything"? It had a high quality web browser, comparable to Safari? Please, don't make me laugh. Japanese phones may have a bunch of features on paper, but on the iPhone the features are actually real world usable. HUGE difference.

Read what Sushi posted about the most compelling Japanese cell phone features like live TV and video chat -- you use them the first month you have a phone and then stop, because they kill the battery dead, or cost to much or are poorly executed/totally convoluted.

 

[slu]

it all depends how you define smartphone. in my opinion most phones sold in japan nowadays are very much smartphones, having had internet and email capabilities for years, first ones for a decade.

if you define "smartphone" being basicly iphone of course the numbers look nice.

i think japanese mobile phone market is in the neighborhood of 100m devices a year and iphone sells 2m units a year there.

so iphone commands about 2% of japanese smartphone markets.

I am not going to disagree with the basic premise that you can make the numbers look how you like depending on your definition of "smartphone", but I find it ironic that you basically disparage this statistic for being made up and then make up your own statistic.

I don't claim to be an expert on the Japanese cell phone users or markets, but there is no way the Japanese cell phone market is 100m devices per year. The entire population of Japan is ~125m, so it seems unlikely that they are selling almost 1 mobile phone per person in the country each year. The estimates I see by doing a quick search seem to be ~40 or 50m devices per year.

 

[KnightWRX]

"Everything"? It had a high quality web browser, comparable to Safari? Please, don't make me laugh. Japanese phones may have a bunch of features on paper, but on the iPhone the features are actually real world usable. HUGE difference.

Safari doesn't a smartphone make. Let go of the kool aid for a minute and realise what my argument was : The "smartphone" tag is BS. The iPhone isn't any smarter than "dumb" phones are. The feature phones all have the same features the iPhone does. Web, E-mail, Apps, games. The iPhone isn't special. It gets special treatment as a "smartphone" in articles like this to make it seem bigger than it actually is.

That was the crux of my argument, to which you didn't reply anything. And my SE was plenty real world usuable, I used it for over 3 years.

 

[zacman]

"Everything"? It had a high quality web browser, comparable to Safari? Please, don't make me laugh.

Opera Mini has been out how long? 5 to 6 years? And it's much faster than Safari even on my old E51.

IMHO Apple just hijacked the term "smartphone" and defined it as "can surf the internet". While before you expected a lot more from a smartphone, like many business features the iPhone still lacks. You still can't send S/MIME mails with an iPhone which is really important for lots of companies. CRM support like on the WM phones is another example.

 

[mojibake]

... That's because no one in Japan uses a smartphone.
Regular phones in Japan are powerful enough.. they have TVs and stuff on their phones.

^^^ The most accurate thing said in this thread.

 

[koobcamuk]

The iPhone really isn't much of a smartphone at all.

Read what Sushi posted about the most compelling Japanese cell phone features like live TV and video chat -- you use them the first month you have a phone and then stop, because they kill the battery dead, or cost to much or are poorly executed/totally convoluted.

I was in Japan for a few months and used the TV feature every day on my commute. I've only video called in the UK and it's just too expensive (network fault, not phone).

There is a 1SEG application for the iPhone so that people can watch mobile TV with a special adaptor. People do use it for a lot longer than the first month - I see many people using it on trains.

Next month I hope to get the Sharp WX-T923 which is the 923SH unlocked for the Taiwanese market. I am bored of my iPhone and want a nice flip phone to use.

 

[caf9128]

this story shows how worthless the above article really is:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/12/18/iphone-nabs-46-pecent-of-japanese-smartphone-market-the-tiny-ja/

 

[ArrowSmith]

Apple takes advantage of the sad Japanese daily existence. They spend 90% of their time in commuting situations which necessitate finding some sort of entertainment, thus smartphones become vital to keeping sanity. Very sad to see Apple exploiting people's misery for pro$$it.

 

[str1f3]

Opera Mini has been out how long? 5 to 6 years? And it's much faster than Safari even on my old E51.

IMHO Apple just hijacked the term "smartphone" and defined it as "can surf the internet". While before you expected a lot more from a smartphone, like many business features the iPhone still lacks. You still can't send S/MIME mails with an iPhone which is really important for lots of companies. CRM support like on the WM phones is another example.

You shouldn't compare Opera Mini to ANY modern Webkit browser. It's not even a real browser. It's more a communication device to Opera's servers. It surely doesn't support things like HTML5 and CSS3.

As for the iPhone stretching the "smartphone", you seem to do that moreso. You are citing business requirements as being a pre-requisite for the specs of a smartphone. If you argued thr it can't multitask with 3rd party apps, I would have taken it more seriously.

 

[KnightWRX]

You shouldn't compare Opera Mini to ANY modern Webkit browser. It's not even a real browser. It's more a communication device to Opera's servers. It surely doesn't support things like HTML5 and CSS3.

So I guess Internet Explorer isn't a real browser either by those standards ?

Opera Mini is very much a real browser and is in constant developpement. The features will come, Opera has some of the best standards support around (not to mention about every browser innovation out there came out of Opera...).

 

[Rodimus Prime]

I am not going to disagree with the basic premise that you can make the numbers look how you like depending on your definition of "smartphone", but I find it ironic that you basically disparage this statistic for being made up and then make up your own statistic.

I don't claim to be an expert on the Japanese cell phone users or markets, but there is no way the Japanese cell phone market is 100m devices per year. The entire population of Japan is ~125m, so it seems unlikely that they are selling almost 1 mobile phone per person in the country each year. The estimates I see by doing a quick search seem to be ~40 or 50m devices per year.

You have a lot to learn about the Japan then. The turn over rate for cell phones and a lot of other products there is much much higher. For example I want to say the average length of time a car is kept is like 3 years compared to 5-6 years in the US. Plus the used car market there is a lot smaller. Given that info and compare the fact that in the US phones are replaced about every 18 months it seems very reasonable that the average life of a phone there is a year or less. Plus japanese people are much more technology advance than us in the US. This means a larger chunk of them have a cell phone and very advance phones at that

Over all I think the numbers are a load of crap and really need a better defined so not to see some fanboys here spam this link in every thread screaming how great apple is

 

[str1f3]

So I guess Internet Explorer isn't a real browser either by those standards ?

Opera Mini is very much a real browser and is in constant developpement. The features will come, Opera has some of the best standards support around (not to mention about every browser innovation out there came out of Opera...).

IE is a lousy browser. Every single OS maker is using or will be using Webkit besides MS. Even RIM has purchased a company that develops Webkit browsers. Besides have you been looking at how Windows Mobile is doing lately?

Opera Mobile is not a real web browser. All the rendering is done by Opera servers and not on the browser itself. These are are meant for non-smartphones (or a Nintendo DS) which doesn't have the power to properly render websites. It means a limited amount of functionality especially with emerging technologies.

 

[KnightWRX]

IE is a lousy browser. Every single OS maker is using or will be using Webkit besides MS. Even RIM has purchased a company that develops Webkit browsers. Besides have you been looking at how Windows Mobile is doing lately?

I don't particularly care for Windows Mobile or Windows in general. The point is supporting HTML5 or CSS3 is not a requisite to being a "real browser".

Nokia still uses Gecko for their mobile needs. There are plans to move to Webkit, but nothing is finalized and those plans may still change. Webkit is not the only good HTML/CSS engine out there you know (heck, It wasn't always as good as it is now, I remember using exclusively circa 1999-2000 when it was still called KHTML).

Opera Mobile is not a real web browser. All the rendering is done by Opera servers and not on the browser itself. These are are meant for non-smartphones (or a Nintendo DS) which doesn't have the power to properly render websites. It means a limited amount of functionality especially with emerging technologies.

Wait, it's not a real browser how exactly ? What does it matter where the rendering code runs ? In fact, I'd rather my phone just write and read to a bunch of sockets than spend time parsing HTML/CSS, much easier on the battery.

Let the big iron servers do all the rendering if it saves me processing power/battery. The result is the same, and the big servers aren't limited in what they can support. A rendering engine, no matter where it runs, can support every standard there is and every non-standard too. Opera is very good as far as rendering engines go.

You're just trying to make it sound like you have an argument. The fact remains : The iPhone isn't any smarter than any other phone. It's just billed as a "smartphone" and positionned against limited other devices so that its market share can look bigger than it really is for these analysts. Same goes for RIM, Symbian, WebOS, Android. Smartphones in general are a sham.

 

[str1f3]

I don't particularly care for Windows Mobile or Windows in general. The point is supporting HTML5 or CSS3 is not a requisite to being a "real browser".

Nokia still uses Gecko for their mobile needs. There are plans to move to Webkit, but nothing is finalized and those plans may still change. Webkit is not the only good HTML/CSS engine out there you know (heck, It wasn't always as good as it is now, I remember using exclusively circa 1999-2000 when it was still called KHTML).



Wait, it's not a real browser how exactly ? What does it matter where the rendering code runs ? In fact, I'd rather my phone just write and read to a bunch of sockets than spend time parsing HTML/CSS, much easier on the battery.

Let the big iron servers do all the rendering if it saves me processing power/battery. The result is the same, and the big servers aren't limited in what they can support. A rendering engine, no matter where it runs, can support every standard there is and every non-standard too. Opera is very good as far as rendering engines go.

You're just trying to make it sound like you have an argument. The fact remains : The iPhone isn't any smarter than any other phone. It's just billed as a "smartphone" and positionned against limited other devices so that its market share can look bigger than it really is for these analysts. Same goes for RIM, Symbian, WebOS, Android. Smartphones in general are a sham.

Like I said everyone is or will be using Webkit as their default browser besides MS.

Also I'd like to see where your claims are of Opera providing bettery battery life, a faster browser, or better browser than Safari. Any reviews that I've seen said Safari is better as for speed, well:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ahGo7RzZKoE

In that video it shows Safari rendering websites as fast and slightly faster than Opera Mini on wifi without Safari needing the ability to have Opera's servers compress the size of the page so it can be viewed on a non-smartphone (or whatever you want to call them seeing as I don't care). ArsTechnica's review on Opera Mini 5:

http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/revi...is-a-big-step-forward-for-little-browsing.ars

while they considered it a good browser, it didn't handle things like Javascript really well because of Opera servers being the middle man.

As for what is and what isn't a smartphone, I really couldn't care less. I have no personal interest to know where the boundaries lie. It is important to note what Opera Mini is actually meant for: low end phones who don't have the processing power or the battery life/capacity to handle native rendering of web pages.

 

[sushi]

What is a smartphone?

Wikipedia says this.

I found this comment interesting:

There is no industry standard definition of a smartphone.

As I've mentioned before, the difference between a typical cell phone (at least here in Japan) and a smartphone is somewhat convoluted.

 

[slu]

You have a lot to learn about the Japan then. The turn over rate for cell phones and a lot of other products there is much much higher. For example I want to say the average length of time a car is kept is like 3 years compared to 5-6 years in the US. Plus the used car market there is a lot smaller. Given that info and compare the fact that in the US phones are replaced about every 18 months it seems very reasonable that the average life of a phone there is a year or less. Plus japanese people are much more technology advance than us in the US. This means a larger chunk of them have a cell phone and very advance phones at that

Over all I think the numbers are a load of crap and really need a better defined so not to see some fanboys here spam this link in every thread screaming how great apple is

Unlike yourself, I never claimed to know anything about Japan.

I looked it up. Per Gartner, in Japan, about 50m mobile phones per year are sold. And in fact the number of phones sold in Japan in 2008 was less than it was in 2007.

So no, it is not reasonable to assume the average life of a phone in Japan is a year or less. And Cars have nothing to do with cell phones. And even if it did, the first source I found said that they average Japanese person holds on to their new cars for seven years.

Again, the irony is off the charts. Perhaps you are the one that needs to learn something about Japan. I'll stick to the opinions of sushi and the other posters in this thread who actually live in Japan rather than what you and others make up about it. And I have actually been to Japan (albeit just Narita for several hours, but that is still in Japan).

 

[KnightWRX]

Like I said everyone is or will be using Webkit as their default browser besides MS.

And like I said, that is a ridiculous claim and in no way does it relate in anyway to my original argument that the browser doesn't a smartphone make.

 

[scottness]

don't get me wrong. I fully believe in Uncle Stevie and all his products, but is this really possible when the iPhone doesn't have the features that ANALysts insist are key to adoption in Japan (i.e. Streaming TV, pay services like using phone for train fare, etc.)?

I was just in Tokyo in November, and I didn't see that many iPhones during all the times that I rode the train, went to work, and walked around different neighborhoods (ex: Shinjuku, Akihabara, Harajuku, Roppongi)

Yes, i know not everyone walks around with their cell phones in their hands, but for all the people that I did see with their cell phones out, only 3 out of a large number had iPhones.

btw, as always, regardless of good or bad numbers, forever always FTW

My experience has been different. I saw quite a few (too many to count) iPhones in Shibuya, Akhabara and Ginza.

 

[scottness]

You have a lot to learn about the Japan then. The turn over rate for cell phones and a lot of other products there is much much higher. For example I want to say the average length of time a car is kept is like 3 years compared to 5-6 years in the US. Plus the used car market there is a lot smaller. Given that info and compare the fact that in the US phones are replaced about every 18 months it seems very reasonable that the average life of a phone there is a year or less. Plus japanese people are much more technology advance than us in the US. This means a larger chunk of them have a cell phone and very advance phones at that

Over all I think the numbers are a load of crap and really need a better defined so not to see some fanboys here spam this link in every thread screaming how great apple is

Lmao! Have you ever been to Japan? Where did you get those numbers? Culturally, the Japanese hold on to things much longer than those in the US. Ask any Japanese transplant how they'd compare.