The 25 Biggest Companies in Mobile - by their revenues in mobile only - an "Ahonen 25" Index?

Well, if I've been up all night, it can only mean one thing - I was playing with my statistics. I had been meaning to do this for quite some while but last night the inspiration hit me, and I went at it. I think I may have created something honestly unique for our industry: A listing of the 25 largest companies in the mobile industry, ranked only by their mobile-related revenues. What I mean is that if you take Vodafone, a mobile telecoms giant, they also have some fixed telecoms assets. How big is the 'mobile-only' side of Vodafone? And what of Nokia if we keep the phones and those parts of the networking business which is mobile, but exclude that part of NokiaSiemens Networks which is fixed landline business. And with Samsung, not counting the plasma screen TVs and laptop PCs, only mobile. You get the picture. And once I had this for the biggest companies related to mobile, I then ranked them by revenues.

This was a voluntary, freebie, hobby type of project, so I was not going to get very precise. But am sure the numbers are very respective of the relative value of the mobile parts of each of these 'companies' - what they would in fact be generating if they were spun off as independent corporations (some are purely mobile business already, like China Mobile for example). Note I have often created a made-up name for the company to indicate its mobile-only nature.

I have never seen anything like this in the public domain. If any of our readers has found something like this, please let me know and I can go and compare. But for our readers, here is, for want of a better name for it, the 2010 "Ahonen Index Top 25 of Mobile Industry"

1   Vodafone Mobile, UK . . . . . . . .  $ 67 B . . . mobile operator
2   Nokia Mobile, Finland . . . . . . . . $ 66 B . . . handset manufacturer
3   China Mobile, China . . . . . . . . . $ 65 B . . . mobile operator
4   Verizon Wireless, USA . . . . . . . $ 62 B . . . mobile operator
5   Telefonica Movil, Spain . . . . . . . .$ 55 B . . . mobile operator

6   T-Mobile, Germany . . . . . . . . . . .$ 50 B . . . mobile operator
7   AT&T Wireless, USA . . . . . . . . . $ 49 B . . . mobile operator
8   Orange Mobile, France . . . . . . . . $ 47 B . . . mobile operator
9   TIM, Italy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . $ 40 B . . . mobile operator
10  Samsung Mobile, South Korea . . $ 38 B . . . handset manufacturer

11  NTT DoCoMo, Japan . . . . . . . . . $ 37 B . . . mobile operator
12  Sprint Nextel, USA . . . . . . . . . . $ 36 B . . . mobile operator
13  America Movil, Mexico . . . . . . . .$ 31 B . . . mobile operator
14  KDDI Mobile, Japan . . . . . . . . . .$ 25 B . . . mobile operator
15  LM Ericsson Mobile, Sweden . . .$ 24 B . . . network infrastructure vendor

16  China Unicom, China . . . . . . . . .$ 22 B . . . mobile operator
17  Motorola Mobile, USA . . . . . . . . $ 21 B . . . handset manufacturer
18  Huawei Mobile, China . . . . . . . . .$ 19 B . . . network infrastructure vendor
19  Softbank Mobile, Japan . . . . . . . $ 18 B . . . mobile operator
20  Alcatel-Lucent Mobile, France . .  $ 16 B . . . network infrastructure vendor

21  Apple iPhone, USA . . . . . . . . . . $ 13 B . . . handset manufacturer
22  SK Telecom, South Korea . . . . . $ 12 B . . . mobile operator
23  RIM, Canada . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .$ 11 B . . . handset manufacturer
24  Telenor Mobile, Norway . . . . . . . $ 11 B . . . mobile operator
25  MTS, Russia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .$ 10 B . . . mobile operator

So 10 companies of the Top 25 are from Europe, 8 from Asia and 7 from North America. Not how incredibly widely the industry global leadership is spread - across 15 countries including 5 giants based out of the Emerging World economies (3 in China, 1 in Mexico and 1 in Russia). In fact of the Top 10 biggest companies, they are based out of 9 separate countries.

Very clearly, the USA, Finland/Scandinavia and Japan do not hold the global control of this industry. Out of the Top 25 biggest companies, only 11 reside in the 'traditional' leadership countries of mobile telecoms - Scandinavia (Finland, Norway and Sweden have 1 company each, for total of 3); Japan has 3, and the USA has 5 of the biggest giants of the mobile industry. 14 out of the Top 25 are based in 'other countries' than these three regions of traditional mobile industry leadership. As to their industry sub-sectors, listing their primary business focus (many do multiple things) 17 are mobile operators (carriers), 5 are handset makers, and 3 infrastructure providers.

There you have it. I would love any feedback, if you see an obvious company missing for some reason (I believe I have checked all the obvious ones like Microsoft, Google, Cisco, Telstra, Hutchison, TeliaSonera etc. Don't just send a 'suggestion' haha, but if you are convinced some company does earn more than ten billion dollars annually out of their mobile-specific business) I'd love to hear about it. And if you do know of any similar listing that is specific to mobile, covers all network operators/carriers, handsets and infrastructure vendors (and any others if relevant), please let me know.

You may freely reference this "Ahonen Index" haha, and please do link back to this blog if you do. I hope to have similar passion a year from now, perhaps I could make this an annual listing haha.. (and yes, for other less esoteric stats of the mobile industry, take a look at the TomiAhonen Almanac 2010)

Comments

[Big pete]

great stuff; does the revenue of companies like Vodafone also take into account their percentage ownership of companies like China Mobile and Verizon at all?

[Andrew]

Can I ask how you've annualised the data? Apple looked a little high to me: Their FY09 iPhone revenues were $m 6,754 and their Q1 10 iPhone revenues were $m 5,578. I'm too lazy to look up the Q1 09, but even assuming that Q1 09 iPhone revenue was zero, you get to $m 12,332.

Also, assuming you're annualising to CY 2009, surely it should be the 2009 index? :)

[Antoine RJ Wright]

When I'm up all night, things like this happen. Then again, I don't play with statistics, so maybe you are a special case (hehehe). Very cool from a high-level perspective. If this were to be more or less detailed, it would have to take into account things like shared mobile revenues between carriers (what @BigPete mentioned) and probably some other factors.

Makes for a nice talking piece though. A really nice one.

[online doctor]

Mobile companies increase earnings because of the demand of cellphone in the market.

[Faith McGary-Sepcic]

Perfect!

[kevin]

Apple looks too low. For 2009, Apple reported iPhone revenue as $15.671B. That does not include any iTunes or App Store revenue, accessories (iPod/iPhone licensing), or services (AppleCare) revenue. It includes some deferred revenue from 2007/2008 sales, but discounts revenue deferred from 2009 sales; 2009 revenues were greater than the sum of 2007/2008 revenues by $5B. And, of course, it doesn't include iPod touch, either.

Possibly you used Apple's prior GAP revenues, which have all since been adjusted for the new GAP rules?

[Tomi Ahonen]

Hi Big Pete, Andrew, Antoine, online, Faith and kevin

Thank you all for the kind comments. quick replies to each

Big Pete - I took all data from annual reports and quarterly reports and yes, they report it there so yes it is included (should be..)

Andrew - very quick Q&D style analysis only (I started on Wall Street gosh, two decades ago now, am I really that old, ouch..) so its 'superficial' - recognize I did this overnight, through over 60 companies to get this top 25, and had to chase many of the numbers from foreign websites etc. But note that someone else said Apple was too low haha

Antoine - thanks!

online - yeah we agree

Faith - thank you so much

kevin - haha Apple too low? compare with Andrew above who said too high.. I think its a reasonably good 'balance' for a given analyst if some say its too low and others say its too high haha... But yeah, I was that tired I was not paying attention was a given candidate on new GAP rules or old. Sorry. Like
I said, its a night time freebie job for no other reason than that I just love my numbers and this was a fun little project. A decade ago I would have done it also but only on my own PC and wouldn't have had a way to share. Now with blogs, at least I get to share it haha..

Thank you all for comments.

Tomi Ahonen :-)

[NickNZ]

It's impressive that Telenor, from a relatively small country, is number 24. They have a good strategy to work early with emerging markets, focusing on subscriber growth.

[Peter Cranstone]

Very impressive. Close to a trillion a year business in just the top 25 businesses. Even if you're off by a few billion it's irrelevant - we're talking about a huge global market place and one that's going to get bigger.

[cheap discount computers]

well mobile companies are doing great job in the market they are earning a lot but the computers or laptop companies are not earning as much as mobile companies are
because mobile phones are very cheap as compare to laptops they are very expensive so people prefer mobile phones.

[online doctors]

I expect these trends to continue. The potential for growth is unlimited. The future of computing is mobile.

[Cheap Computers]

I thought that India would also be included as it's one of the biggest population holder.

[Laptop Batteries]

ery impressive. Close to a trillion a year business in just the top 25 businesses.

[karen millen outlet]

We will not be beaten on price.

[backpack]

I recently came across your article and have been reading along. I want to express my

admiration of your writing skill and ability to make readers read from the beginning to the

end. I would like to read newer posts and to share my thoughts with you.

[refurbished laptops]

I really liked your blog quite informative and interesting facts and figures you have discussed on your blog even the comments are very fruitful and helpful in enhancing the knowledge regarding the topic.

[Christian Louboutin Boots,Christian Louboutin Flats,Christian Louboutin Hot Red]

It's always nice when you can not only be informed, but also entertained! I'm sure you had fun writing this article.

[NancyGilbert21]

Houses are not cheap and not everyone is able to buy it. However, personal loans was invented to help different people in such kind of hard situations.

[louboutin]

I had been meaning to do this for quite some while but last night the inspiration hit me

[SEO Services India]

There are may person searching about that now they will find enough resources by your post.