“Nokia Oyj, the Finnish mobile-phone maker trying to win back customers of Apple Inc.’s iPhone and devices using Google Inc.’s Android, unveiled a version of its flagship smartphone for China’s largest wireless carrier,” Bloomberg News reports.
“China Mobile Ltd. agreed to carry the Lumia 920T, which is compatible with the country’s homegrown TD-SCDMA technology that powers the carrier’s network, the companies said in a statement today,” Bloomberg reports. “The handset, the first Lumia based on Microsoft Corp’s Windows Phone 8 software for the Chinese market, will cost 4,599 yuan ($739) without a contract and will go on sale before the end of this month.”
Bloomberg reports, “The deal with China Mobile, whose network standard has prevented it from carrying the iPhone, will widen the Hong Kong-listed carrier’s range of more expensive smartphones to battle for market share. China Mobile, the world’s biggest mobile-phone company, had 703 million subscribers at the end of October, including 79.3 million users of high-speed, third-generation services that give smartphones faster Internet access. The carrier competes with China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd. and China Telecom Corp., both of which sell subsidized iPhones.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Trying to win back iPhone users is a lost cause. Studies show that iPhone users, like Apple product users in general, are an extremely loyal bunch (see below). Sincere good luck, however, in taking sales from the derivative Android, Nokia.
As we wrote over a year ago on October 27, 2011:
Windows Phone will be popular. Over time, it’ll eat the lunch of the increasingly fragmented, increasingly insecure, and increasingly costly Android (losing patent infringement lawsuits and dropping features/paying royalties to multiple IP owners will do that to you).
The not-iPhone world will begin to dump Android and move to Microsoft’s mobile OS offering because it will eventually cost less, work better, and come with far fewer legal issues. In the iPhone wannabe market, it’s already happening (Nokia, for example). We expect the same to happen in the iPad wannabe market, too. Google and Microsoft will long battle each other for the non-Apple markets and that’s a much better scenario for everyone than having a single ripoff artist flood the market with fragmented, insecure, beta-esque, mediocre-at-best products. Google’s attempt to be the next Microsoft is doomed.
This, of course, will also impact Google’s search business. Apple’s Siri will increasingly deliver info to users sans Google and Microsoft will, naturally, use Bing for their search. As we’ve said many times in the past: Google will rue the day they got greedy by deciding to try to work against Apple instead of with them.
The bottom line: We’d rather see a company trying unique ideas, even if – shockingly – it’s Microsoft, than the wholesale theft of Apple innovations that we’ve been seeing for over
four[five] years now. Don’t steal IP. Even worse, don’t steal IP and “claim to be innovators.” We have no problem with any companies that attempt to compete with Apple using their own unique ideas and strategies.
Related articles:
China’s tablet market grows 63 percent in third quarter; Apple iPad is king with 71 percent unit share – November 28, 2012
21% of iOS users say they wouldn’t switch to another platform for any price – June 29, 2012
38% of U.S. iPhone sales are to refugees from Android or RIM, up from 29% in February – June 7, 2012
J.D. Power: Apple ranks highest in smartphone customer satisfaction for 7th consecutive time – March 16, 2012
Bloodbath: More than one in four Android users, over half of BlackBerry users plan to buy Apple iPhone 5 – September 28, 2011
Isn’t helping Apple stock price. Dropping like a rock. Again. It was up more than $80 from its recent low of $505. Hope you took some profit this time. And we’re still waiting to get the iPhone on China Mobile. And waiting and waiting……………..
A qucik glance at aapl’s chart will be enlightening. First in 2011 aapl ranged from 300-400 ALL YEAR. That certainly tried my patience. But the stock took off in 2012 and grew 70%.
Sure the stock has pulled back but it is still up 40% for the year. Only Amazon has matched that and we all know that stock is hyper inflated.
Since 2007 when I bought as much aapl stock as possible it has grown 700%. Again only Amazon can match that but it has zero profits so I bet that stock will tank sooner or later.
My best guess is that we will continue in the same mode until this fiscal cliff debacle is sorted out and Apple releases its stellar earnings. If the market hasn’t over hyped aapl predicted results we will start to see the stock climb up again.
First and Last!