iPhone big in Japan- but as a second phone
ElektronistaMag’s Christiane Vejloe has been to Tokyo and Seoul to bring you a look at cutting edge technology and trends from the east.
You see them talking and texting on colorful flip phones but reading emails and gaming on an iPhone. To many japanese elektronistas the iPhone has become the second phone, and it is seen more as a tiny multimedia computer than as a phone.
It is not easy to break in Japan. It is a country notoriously know to be hostile towards non-domestic products. When launched the iPhone did have a hard time in the japanese market. But things are changing and the market has changed drastically in the last year. Now Apple has 72% of the japanese smart phone market.
Even if there seems to be a growing love for the iPhone it is still not compatable with the hugely popular japanese mobile payment system and can therefore not fulfill all the mobile needs of a busy japanese user. It does not give access to popular mobile television and the video and camera functionalities in the iPhone just does not really cut it in this tricker happy country. On the other hand it is smaller than a notebook and still have many usefull functionalities making it popular with a population, where the preference for small, handy and effiecient technology seems to be a part of the DNA. And for the same reason many japanese people consider their mobile phone their personal computer. Right now it looks like many japanese people are choosing both a multimedia smart phone like the iPhone and a regular phone for the classic talking and texting, mobile payment, mobile internet sites and watching television.
Even if Apple is dominating right now the competitors are breathing behind them. HTC holds 11% of the smartphone market share, and Toshiba a 6.8% market share.
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