The mobile phone winners and losers of 2007
2008 has finally arrived, bringing with it a whole new year of mobile phone goodness. Before predicting what phones are on their way for 2008, though, let's look back at 2007, and see what trends emerged and who were the winners and losers.
In addition to summarising the year, I'll also see which of the speculative guesses I made about 2007's phones actually came true. A similar look forward to the phones of 2008 will be made in a forthcoming post.
1. Sony Ericsson
First off, what happened with Sony Ericsson? Well, the short answer is, not a lot! A year ago I wrote that Sony Ericsson "...had a successful, if somewhat low-key 2006, with great phones that clearly worked, but which lacked the wow factor that Nokia and Samsung managed to give us."
For 2007, Sony Ericsson seemed to follow the same strategy. If it ain't broke, and all that, I guess. Still, it was disappointing to see a raft of phones that although good in their own right, still never managed to set the world on fire.
We did get the Sony Ericsson K850i CyberShot phone, which still sets the benchmark as the best camera phone on the market (although it may concede that to the Samsung G800), and the W960i Walkman phone, which offers touchscreen musicy goodness. But nothing like the technological marvels that Nokia and co were showing off.
Worse, the rumours of a HandyCam phone, Bravia phone and even a PSP phone simply didn't materialise, and so all we got was a variety of better CyberShot and Walkman phones. More evolution than revolution.
Sony Ericsson did consolidate its position as the fourth biggest mobile phone company in the world, though, so clearly its strategy paid off. However, with the advent of the iPhone in 2007, and new Google Android-based phones coming in 2008, not to mention the forthcoming Sat-Nav phones from Nokia, Sony Ericsson will have to raise its game beyond the camera phones and music phones if they're to continue their success in 2008.
2. Nokia
Nokia had a spectacular 2007, cementing its position as the world's number one mobile phone manufacturer, and releasing a range of first class innovative products that really did have the wow factor. Top of the range was the Nokia N95, which not only combined a host of advanced features, it also became one of Nokia's best selling phones, despite its hefty price tag.
Rumour-wise, we were expecting the Nokia N-Gage platform to find its way into certain phones, and this came true with the launch of the 8GB Nokia N81 multimedia powerhouse, and the Sat-Nav-enabled Nokia N82. Nokia also provided an online store for dowonloading music and games over the air, and sought to exapand its Sat-Nav offerings by buying GPS mapping company Navtec.
Indeed, Sat-Nav will form a key strategy of Nokia's future plans for 2008, enabling it to push into new expanding markets beyond that of mobile phones. By aiming to replace GPS devices with mobile phones, and even taking on Google in the mobile advertising space, Nokia's plans go far further than most other mobile phone companies, and show how keenly the company is competing to retain its number one spot.
In short, the rumours surrounding Nokia's 2007 plans were pretty much spot on, while the company's business strategy was also spot on. Expect more great things from Nokia in 2008.
3. Samsung
Samsung made great strides in 2007, overtaking Motorola to become the world's number two mobile phone manufacturer. It offered, as ever, a huge range of mobile phones, and continued its strategy of focusing on high-end technically innovative phones, rather than going for just the budget end of the market.
Samsung's Ultra range was particularly well received. Focusing on being the thinnest phones in their class (and even the thinnest phone in the world, in the case of the Ultra 5.9), the Ultra range mixed technological innovation with a cool sleek style, which was a nice departure from Samsung's previous phones, which had a tendency to be a bit, well, functional in appearance.
The Samsung U600 was a perfect example of this design philosophy. Not only was it the world's thinnest slider phone, it also came with a 3.2 megapixel camera that was the envy of many phones more than twice its size.
Samsung ended the year on a high, too, with the Samsung G800, a 5 megapixel camera phone with optical zoom and auto-focus, and picture quality that at least matched, and in some cases even surpassed, the best that Sony Ericsson could offer.
In short, a great year for Samsung, and with rumours of an 8 megapixel camera phone being worked on by the company, 2008 should be just as good as well.
4. LG
LG also had a successful year, but still trailed as the fifth biggest mobile phone manufacturer. However, it, too, had a great year, largely on the back of its hugely successful LG Chocolate and LG Shine range of designer phones. Both of these phones sold in the millions, and helped raise the visibility of LG, as well as its profits.
Of all the mobile phone manufacturers, LG was probably the most successful in exploiting 2007's trend of designer phones, further pushing the bar with the launch of the LG Prada phone. Not only was this a great looking phone, it was also technologically advanced, featuring a touchscreen interface that wasn't a million miles away from that of the iPhone.
However, the winds of change blow extremely quickly in the mobile phone world, and Motorola had shown how risky it was to base your entire business model around one sector of the market (i.e. designer phones). As such, as people's tastes shifted from designer phones to more technologically advanced phones, LG responded swiftly with the glorious LG Viewty. Not only did this offer 5 megapixels, making it a challenger to the Sony Ericsson K850i, Samsung G800 and Nokia N95, it was also the first phone to offer a video recording rate of up to 60 frames per second, letting you play back your videos in slow motion.
Add a touchscreen as well, and the LG Viewty really captured the imagination with a combination of style and technical features that Motorola singularly lacked.
LG look set for a strong 2008, as they clearly have both the technological prowess and marketing vision to provide phones that the public wants at the right time and the right price.
5. Motorola
Of course, where there are winners, there have to be losers, and there was no bigger loser in 2007 than Motorola. Stubbornly sticking to its tried (and tired) and tested strategy of releasing yet more Motorola RAZRs, the company failed to innovate. The public grew tired of the RAZR brand, and even more tired of the way in which Motorola's phones were at least a year behind other phones in terms of features.
Add to that the fact that Samsung and LG raised their game in terms of the looks of their phones, at least matching the style of the RAZR, and even surpassing it in some cases, and it was no wonder that customers deserted Motorola in droves, causing the company to lose its number two spot to Samsung, and recording a loss for 2007, just to make matters worse.
Indeed, Motorola's strategy was so bad, it was the only one of the big five manufacturers to post a loss on its mobile phone products, and this despite the fact that the mobile phone market is still growing (there are now more than 3.3 billion mobile phones around the world.
2008 doesn't look very bright, either, as although the company has been making the right noises (particularly in terms of its need to innovate more), there's been precious little sign of innovative products coming from the company. Time will tell, but if Motorola don't turn it around soon, they could find themselves slipping even further down the rankings in 2008, with Sony Ericsson eager to displace them from third spot.
Summary
So there we have it: 2007 in a nutshell. The winners include Nokia, which looks set to build on its stellar 2007 with an aggressive expansion into the Sat-Nav and mobile advertising market, having proved that Sat-Nav phones really do work, and Samsung, who made the impressive leap from number three to number two manufacturer, and who continued making first class technically innovative (and always "world's slimmest..."!) mobile phones.
Also a winner was LG, who deftly rode the designer phone wave before switching to catch the full-featured phone wave as the designer phone wave rode itself out.
Losers include Motorola, of course, whose product range was anaemic, and whose sales were even worse.
Finally, comes Sony Ericsson who were neither winners or losers. They retained their fourth spot, but increased their sales and profits for 2007, so in that sense they can be called winners. However, their range, although solid for 2007, is in danger of becoming stale, relying too much on music phones and camera phones. So although I'll chalk them up as a winner overall for 2007, the jury's out for 2008, and I still maintain they need to innovate more if they're to challenge Motorola for the number three spot, and hold off LG, who are snapping at their heels.
Trend-wise, one of the real surprises of 2007 was the re-emergence of the camera phone. Mobile TV was predicted to be big in 2007, but proved as popular as 3G, leaving the field wide open for some truly good quality camera phones to take centre stage.
Smartphones also came of age, with the Nokia E90 showing how feature packed they can be these days, and just how usable they can be as well. The E90 was complimented by the Sony Ericsson P3i and Samsung Ultra F700 (which, admittedly, took its time to come to market), as well as the HTC range of Windows-mobile based smartphones. All of these phones really earned the accolade of smart phones, and show how smartphones are now in a position to take over from the laptop, at least for short periods of time.
Finally, of course, we have the main event of 2007: the iPhone, which not only dominated the news a year ago, it clearly overshadowed the CES 2007 Exhibition in Las Vegas. When it launched to a hysterical crowd, the iPhone was lauded as a revolutionary innovation that would make all other phones look like dinosaurs in comparison.
The truth, as ever, was very different from the hype. The iPhone did indeed have the world's best mobile interface, but at the expense of an extremely poor camera, no 3G, no video recording abilities, a poor keypad, a battery that can only be replaced by sending the phone back to the factory, and a crippling and restrictive contract. In short, all style, no substance.
What it did do, though, was disrupt the market, forcing every other mobile phone manufacturer to release its own touchscreen mobile phone, even if it was limited ergonomically compared to the iPhone. Expect much more innovation to come in 2008 in the area of user interfaces, as all the other manufacturers seek to make their phones seem just as cool as the iPhone.
So that was 2007. A year of disruption, innovation, and some seriously cool phones. Fortunately, 2008 shows no sign of this trend slowing down. Look out for a glimpse into the phones of 2008 very soon.
Oh, and a Happy New Year to you all!
