INTERVIEW-Nokia says mobile Web to take off next year
By Paul de Bendern
ESPOO, Finland, June 8 (Reuters) - Nokia , the
world's largest mobile phone maker, said a market for high-speed
mobile Internet phones may exist by Christmas, but a full range
of applications will not be available until early next year.
The industry hopes GPRS (General Packet Radio Service)-based
services will be a lucrative business that reignites consumer
interest ahead of the launch of even more powerful and expensive
third-generation (3G) mobile services in coming years.
"GPRS will start during the second half of the year and I
think that by Christmas time it will be a true market, but
that's more for the phones than for the services," Anssi
Vanjoki, Executive Vice President of Nokia Nobile Phones, told
Reuters in a recent interview.
His comments suggested that the GPRS mobile Internet in
Europe and Asia -- excluding Japan -- may need even longer to
take off than earlier expected, preventing carriers from
generating revenues from the services any time soon.
Nokia decided to start selling GPRS phones, also known as
2.5-generation, in Europe only from the third quarter of this
year, later than its nearest rival Motorola , because it
felt the market was not yet ready.
Nokia has said that from the fourth quarter it will be
selling millions of GPRS-enabled phones.
Because of Nokia's huge global mobile phone market share of
over 35 percent, the decision by the Finnish company to wait on
the launch has slowed the take-up of wireless Internet services
in Europe and some parts of Asia, say industry experts.
GPRS phones can maintain a constant connection to the
Internet, which means users will be notified when e-mails
arrive, but only use network capacity when they are downloading.
NOKIA SAYS TECHNOLOGY NOT SALES DRIVER
"GPRS as such offers nothing, it is just the packetising of
the radio space," said Vanjoki, who is also a member of Nokia's
executive board.
He said technology that would make it possible to offer
attractive services like music, video and picture messaging, was
not yet ready.
"You need some efficient applications platforms like
multi-media messaging to do it and that is only going to be
(available) in the first half of 2002 and that's when we will
see the consumer excitement for the services start to happen,"
Vanjoki added.
He said the mobile phone industry had learned that you
should not build up high expectations for new technologies
because they take time to mature.
"So you are better off if you introduce that (new
technology) as a sideline to the main thing," Vanjoki said.
Europe's first flirtation with Internet mobiles using
Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) technology over slower 2G
networks disillusioned customers because handsets were in short
supply and Web access was limited, slow and sometimes
impossible.
Vanjoki said consumers would not buy Nokia's first GPRS
phone, the 8310, for its mobile Internet technology but rather
because of its fashion appeal and range of features.
"The motivation to buy it is the 169 (changeable) covers,
the in-built radio or that it is the smallest possible phone
around. So the justification to buy it is not GPRS, that's an
additional reason to buy it," he said.
This suggests that Nokia is banking on handset designs to
boost phone sales in the third and fourth quarter, and its
competitors will be under pressure to follow suit.
Motorola also has started to put more focus on the design
and user-friendliness of its range of six GPRS phones which are
being launched this year in Europe.
40 PERCENT MARKET SHARE
Vanjoki shrugged off scepticism about Chief Executive Jorma
Ollila's comments last month that Nokia could achieve a global
mobile phone market share of over 40 percent in the long term.
"We are not taking any dramatic conclusion that high market
share cannot be sustained. Time will tell if it canbe
sustained," he said.
Nokia had a market share of over 35 percent -- possibly as
high as 37 percent -- in the first quarter, and has said it was
on target to reach its goal of a 40 percent global market share.
Motorola also boosted its position in the first quarter of
2001 to over 13 percent and told Reuters on Wednesday that it
had raised it by a further one to two percentage points in the
April to June period.
REUTERS
Rtr 09:45 06-08-01 |
