iPhone Continues Strong Sales in France

The "previous" report is for the entire cell phone industry for the whole world --- not just the US. It's easy to spot that when you look at Nokia's revenue for 6 months at 17 billion dollars --- that's not possible for Nokia where they have a single digit market share in the US.

France's population is about 62 million --- 1/5 of the US population. So 1.8-2 million iphones in France translates to 9-10 million iphones in the US. But we know that close to 50% of the iphones sales came from the US --- so on a per capita basis, Americans still own more iphones per capita than France.

Strong sales in France, Japan, S. Korea - will this ever stop!??? RIM is still trying to recover from their outage...

Strong sales in France, Japan, S. Korea - will this ever stop!??? RIM is still trying to recover from their outage...

It's not that strong.

As I said, Americans with only 1 carrier selling the iphone has more iphone users per capita than French people with all 3 carriers selling the iphone. So it is "strong" because these countries never had much of a market for smartphones.

2 million iPhones in France for 2009, representing approximately 8.5% of the total mobile market

Apple's sales in France are also expected to account for over half of the total smartphone sales there of approximately 3.5 million for the year.

When iPhone started in the U.S., it also had only ~8% of the market initially. If the iPhone grows in Europe at the same rate that it did in the U.S. (it has been three years in the U.S. now), then watch out Nokia! :apple:

So it is "strong" because these countries never had much of a market for smartphones.

[Citation needed], dude!

Europeans were already equipped with Nokia and Ericsson smartphones when Americans were still proud of their piece-of-junk Motorola StarTAC. In mid-2009, Japan had 100 million smartphones, twice the number used in the US [1]. In Q3 2008, 11.6 million smartphones were shipped in the North American market but 14.8 million in the EMEA market - that's 27% more [2].

America was actually lagging behind in the smartphone market, and the surprising thing regarding the article is that it's in the more advanced markets like Japan and Western Europe that the iPhone user growth is now the highest [3]. Maybe it's because the iPhone 2G was very expensive and kinda sucked a little bit, or at least wasn't quite competitive compared to what people already had in these countries. Or maybe it's that the Japanese and the French are not as inclined to base purchase decisions on hype alone like Americans do (StarTAC and RAZR, anybody?). However now that the 3GS has been released, the floodgates are fully open because people in these mature markets are not stupid and they know how to recognize a good piece of gear.


[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/technology/20cell.html
[2] http://www.canalys.com/pr/2009/r2009112.htm
[3] http://brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/12/18/where-in-the-world-are-apples-78-million-handsets/

[Citation needed], dude!

Europeans were already equipped with Nokia and Ericsson smartphones when Americans were still proud of their piece-of-junk Motorola StarTAC. In mid-2009, Japan had 100 million smartphones, twice the number used in the US [1]. In Q3 2008, 11.6 million smartphones were shipped in the North American market but 14.8 million in the EMEA market - that's 27% more [2].

America was actually lagging behind in the smartphone market, and the surprising thing regarding the article is that it's in the more advanced markets like Japan and Western Europe that the iPhone user growth is now the highest [3]. Maybe it's because the iPhone 2G was very expensive and kinda sucked a little bit, or at least wasn't quite competitive compared to what people already had in these countries. Or maybe it's that the Japanese and the French are not as inclined to base purchase decisions on hype alone like Americans do (StarTAC and RAZR, anybody?). However now that the 3GS has been released, the floodgates are fully open because people in these mature markets are not stupid and they know how to recognize a good piece of gear.


[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/technology/20cell.html
[2] http://www.canalys.com/pr/2009/r2009112.htm
[3] http://brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/12/18/where-in-the-world-are-apples-78-million-handsets/

I totally agree! I lived in Europe for some years. I got technologicallly depressed when I went back to the USA. I live now in Canada where it is even worse than in the USA.

[Citation needed], dude!

Europeans were already equipped with Nokia and Ericsson smartphones when Americans were still proud of their piece-of-junk Motorola StarTAC. In mid-2009, Japan had 100 million smartphones, twice the number used in the US [1]. In Q3 2008, 11.6 million smartphones were shipped in the North American market but 14.8 million in the EMEA market - that's 27% more [2].

America was actually lagging behind in the smartphone market, and the surprising thing regarding the article is that it's in the more advanced markets like Japan and Western Europe that the iPhone user growth is now the highest [3]. Maybe it's because the iPhone 2G was very expensive and kinda sucked a little bit, or at least wasn't quite competitive compared to what people already had in these countries. Or maybe it's that the Japanese and the French are not as inclined to base purchase decisions on hype alone like Americans do (StarTAC and RAZR, anybody?). However now that the 3GS has been released, the floodgates are fully open because people in these mature markets are not stupid and they know how to recognize a good piece of gear.


[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/20/technology/20cell.html
[2] http://www.canalys.com/pr/2009/r2009112.htm
[3] http://brainstormtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/12/18/where-in-the-world-are-apples-78-million-handsets/

Nokia symbian phones are basically marketed as high-end feature phones --- the people who bought them don't use it as a smartphone. So when a real smartphone such as the iphone gets launched in Europe --- Nokia's market share of smartphone crashed.

Just because I have a coffee mug that said that I am the greatest dad in the world --- doesn't actually mean anything. It's just a label (used by certain market research companies) to called these Symbian phones as smartphones. Otherwise you might as well move to a communist country --- because communist countries' constitution give their people the most rights (on paper).

I totally agree! I lived in Europe for some years. I got technologicallly depressed when I went back to the USA. I live now in Canada where it is even worse than in the USA.

The problem is people often equate the megapixel count of the cell phone as proof of how high tech the cell phone is.

But the reality is that those "depressed" phones that you detest --- are fully 3G phones. Very high tech, zero frills --- like a formula 1 race car without the cup holder.

In March 2008 quarter, 58% of Verizon's subscribers have an ev-do phone.

http://telephonyonline.com/wireless/news/verizon-data-revenues-0428/

If you look at the article, it went from 40% to 58% in one year (from Q1 2007 to Q1 2008). So with that kind of growth --- Verizon probably has 80%+ of their subscribers using 3G phones.

This is why the 3G penetration rate in the US is higher than the 5 largest countries in Europe (UK, France, Germany, Italy, and Spain with a total population of 300 million).

http://www.ipbusinessmag.com/departments/article/id/452/us-catches-up-with-western-europe-in-3g-mobile

Your so-called "depressed" no-frills American cell phone is actually more technology advanced than the swiss army knife European GSM phone.

all these international sales and rising stock... nokia must be soiling their pants with excitement.

i bet they can't wait for the tablet release either!

Just because I have a coffee mug that said that I am the greatest dad in the world --- doesn't actually mean anything. It's just a label (used by certain market research companies) to called these Symbian phones as smartphones.

If Symbian phones were not smartphones then what was?! Windows Mobile?:p Go ahead and update Wikipedia, buddy, just strike out 50% of the market: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smartphone

Telecommunications is one domain were the US is, or was, lagging behind the majority of developed countries. You could see it in the wireless market because of the roadblocks laid out by the operators, each one owning a separate, incompatible, network. And you can still see it in broadband internet access where lack of government initiative (after the initial pitch), lack of regulation and, again, fragmentation of the market keep America behind with less competition and slower and more expensive services. http://www.businessweek.com/globalbiz/content/jul2007/gb20070718_387052.htm

You sound as if acknowledging our shortcomings and looking around for better ideas was something shameful or anti-patriotic. It's a fact that in America our cell phones used to suck, our internet is still slower and our butts are much fatter. So let's exercise more and invest better. Thinking different often brings good things. Ask Steve.