About Christensen's 3G presentation:
Lindy,
If 3G is viable without HDR, then yes. Mike would finally use one for data, but not "Joe Sixpack".
I believe the point Christensen rightfully makes is to think about how Joe Sixpack would make use of 3G services. Maybe it's to play advanced games. I really dunno. I do know that though 3G offers features, you and I, both having been salespeople, can appreciate that there is a world of difference between features and benefits. The winners will determine and sell the benefits, not the features.
Eric,
I thought he spelled it out his usage of proprietary "closed" nice and concisely.
You've presumably seen my thinking that he never used the word, "closed," much less try to explain it. I think that's something H&Q conjured up.
I think you left out the most important part of Christensen's comments about Nokia. YOu wrote: "worries about Nokia" ... Nokia "makes all the money and their vendors get hammered" ... an interesting comment that TI, Philips, STM, Infineon, Telson and all might be interested in commenting on. You seemingly forgot to explain that the reason he worries about Nokia is because "Nokia is about at the point that they begin overshooting the functionality that people can acutally utilize in those handsets." He explains that as Nokia becomes more entrenched in that phase, it's Nokias suppliers that make the money, not Nokia.
Cha2,
It was also fascinating to me that while he was prepared to discuss Nokia he did not handle the other part of the question on Qualcomm.
The question was if Christensen had any thoughts on "Qualcomm vs. Nokia." Had I been asked the question, I would have said that the "vs" is being hugely over emphasized. The two companies are long-time partners. Yes, they have different short-term agendas, but the important questions about 3G aren't addressed by anything having to do with Nokia vs. Qualcomm.
That brings me to a point I forgot to mention in my first post about the conference call -- that two of the three people asking questions seemed to exhibit very little understanding of 3G in the context of Christensen's expertise, and I'm giving the third one the benefit of the doubt.
It is as if the games that were primitive a few years ago would be enough to fully satisfy game players now. We know that is not so. More and more sophistication and more realistic action has been incorporated in games. Seems like that will happen in wireless applications (especially using both Java and BREW) - so the greater speeds and the capability to handle more than 10 second bits of video or of cartoons, may have a market too.
Based on everything I heard Christensen say, I think he would agree with you. He was merely pointing out that right now DoCoMo is profiting from the currently addressable market. Others could have done it but didn't. The implication I think he makes is that if DoCoMo continues to use such clear thinking, and if others continue to use such unclear thinking, history tells us that DoCoMo will be immensely successful and the others will let the opportunities pass them by. I didn't infer that Christensen feels DoCoMo's current position established with i-Mode will inevitably lead to a dominant marketshare in 3G.
The part that I found most interesting, that I haven't seen mentioned by anyone, is that DoCoMo is trying to partner with the very folks that Christensen says is using the wrong approach to the market. It makes you wonder if DoCoMo management is thinking as clearly as Christensen would believe, or if they're thinking even more clearly, planning to show its new partners in other parts of the world how to target the currently addressable markets.
Judith,
What confused me in CC's presentation was what came later--after initial acceptance. He seemed to imply that DoCoMo could later operate within a closed system quite effectively since that self-containment was elastic--tempered by growing alliances/partnerships.
From my notes, I think Christensen was pretty clear about that so long that you accept my premise that he never referred to a closed system. As the technology product evolves past being "crummy," standards evolve and the need for integrating with partners instead of relying on interdependency sets in. A great example of this is Qualcomm's history. Initially, Qualcomm "did" all the CDMA parts because that was the only way to "do" any of them. As CDMA began accepted as a standard, Qualcomm was far better off integrating with partners and that's the more recent course of action.
I believe I'm now up to date in the discussion. Thanks to everyone for being patient with me until I listened to the conference call.
--Mike Buckley |
