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Technology Stocks : Nokia (NOK)
NOK 6.970+2.0%3:59 PM EST
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To: slacker711 who wrote (2842)11/26/1999 8:05:00 AM
From: tero kuittinen  Read Replies (3) of 34857
 
Slacker - could we put this in some sort of a context? Sprint is smaller than the leading Turkish GSM operator and larger than the leading South African GSM operator. So in an international context, we are talking about a company that is between its peers from South Africa and Turkey in its phone sales impact. I'm not putting Sprint down here - they're holding their own in the Third World league of mobile operators.

But we ain't talking about an international star performer. With 70% growth, 3,5% churn rate, shambolic mobile data program and less than 5 million subs Sprint isn't even on the map compared to the real schorchers in the industry.

Italy's digital mobile phone sales during the 3Q 1999 were about 60% of the US digital phones sales during the same period. Am I getting through here? This jumped-up developing country with less than a quarter of US population and far lower per capita GDP is nearly as important market as America. Omnitel alone is expected to sell 3-6 million WAP phones during the next 12 months. That just may be close to the entire amount of WAP shipments to North America during the same time frame.

So while you obsess about Sprint - I think the really pivotal markets of 1999 were Latin America, Europe and China. Latin America, because this was the year when digital phones broke through there... and the Asian manufacturers were caught with their pants down. Europe, because the volume sales growth of phones is above 90% in both 1998 and 1999. Numbers USA isn't coming even close to reaching in either year. And China, because the urban market penetration of mobile phones reached 20% there. This was the year that you had to clinch your hold on the Chinese market.

I'm not sure you realize the demands of running a truly global company. Most US electronics manufacturers treat foreign markets like a suburb of Austin - they never really tailor their products to local demands. That's why Compaq and Dell were beaten so badly by Legend in China. Nokia has to juggle over 100 markets to stay on top. So far we've seen six consecutive quarters of global market share gains. You find this worrying?

I would be thrilled to see Nokia doing better with Sprint. But there are about 20 more important operators to consider at the same time. It's a big world out there, slacker.

Tero
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