Communities Dominate Brands

Humanity are the data wells that make the black gold of the 21st Century

Refined data the black gold of the 21st Century

Data is the new oil !!

John Naughton in his recent column for The Observer, wrote that in 2006 or thereabouts, a phrase that data was the new oil came into public consciousness. At the time I was sitting on the board of a company specialising in large scale social data analytics (in those days mobile networks were large scale social networks), And I liked to use the term raw data has no value but refined data is the black gold of the 21st Century. My thoughts were that better information created at the size of bytes could deliver better.

Commercial models could evolve and made more effective and efficient, transformed even, by raw data becoming refined data. But there was the potential for much greater things, significant improvements if not transformation in healthcare, education, agriculture, finance, that could deliver so much to us as a society.

The argument for an open model: my argument was that if data was shared, in an open context; open data, open society, open api's we could all benefit. For example, MIT shares its entire curriculum under a creative commons license. Openness is resilience, the default setting not only of what we call nature but our entire cosmology works because of its connectedness and diversity.

The darker side of data: of course this is all true, but the recent developments and revelations from Bradley Manning, Edward Snowden, and Wikileaks is that governments are hoovering up of vast amounts of data, and breaking their own constitutions, it seems, in the process. Whilst we do not know a thing about it. In the same way corporations are behaving in exactly the same way.

The key question about any major technological development is: who benefits? The answer in the case of big data is: huge corporations – the Googles, Amazons and Facebooks of this world, which are the only outfits (outside of the US National Security Agency) with the computational resources to mine, analyse and process the data torrents unleashed by us as we go about our networked lives. The companies don't talk about it this way, of course. Instead they have soothing patter about how their analytical capabilities enable them to serve you better: how the ability to analyse the web searches conducted by you and your friends enables them to provide better search results, for example; or how analysis of your online behaviour enables Amazon to suggest products that you might like; and so on.

All true, of course, but skilfully avoiding the awkward fact that you are the resource that is being mined and that the playing field that is cyberspace is tilted in favour of the corporations who have come to dominate it.

We, Naughton observes are the wells. 

Data, power, privacy, democracy: Naughtons view is dark and dystopian a bit like J.G. Ballard and I don't blame him. After giving a presentation to a technology audience earlier this year, in which I explored the potential of data combined with networked mobile communication technologies to deliver better healthcare, civic infrastructures, education etc., I explored how a city becomes more efficient through large scale data monitoring – then I became deeply concerned, because, if Rio De Janeiro, or Paris, or wherever has all its utilities managed at an atomic level via data and that is run by a private company (IBM), then the question I asked was, has the city lost its sovereignty?

My unease is that corporations are first and foremost responsible to their shareholders and the stockmarket, not to civic duty. And of course this presentation dovetailed with the breaking news of Edward Snowden, and the trial of Bradley Manning. Data, control, coercion, power, and privacy. They all intertwine, democracy in essence is the concept of an open world and that is what I think many fear - we have turned away from the well of democracy to suck at the well of data for darker purposes. And it is darker as there is no consultation of the public realm, no communication of why, purpose and legal remit. We simply must, says the state, be saved from ourselves. Therein lies the catch 22, data is information, nature runs on information freely shared, we call it diversity, the universe is an open eco-system that is perhaps the greater giver of life, taking that idea further communications is also all about power, who has it, who controls it, and ultimately who wields it.

A story about power: Manuel Castells has written extensively on this particular issue in his book Communication Power. And that is the point John Naughton and Slavoj Žižek make on communications, privacy, democracy Perhaps even the potential of our democracies to progress in their current state. For me the bigger picture is that, the more we remove openness from the public realm, the more we monitor because we are fearful of 'the others', the more we attempt to extract rather that regenerate - we are not in a good place. I still believe that data used in the right way can deliver extraordinary benefits to everyday lives in a multiplicity of ways. I worry that since 911 however, our fear of 'the others', has driven us away from working out why our world feels more unsafe, and our response of 'control at all costs', inadequate, because it does not solve the problem. And I also worry that the pursuit of financial gain at all costs (growth for growth sakes is the MO of a cancer cell) also erodes our society. So the point is then to offer an alternative positive view of what next might look like. Because if we cant describe a new destination, we will never be able to get there.

Journey further

• Open systems evolve to states of higher organization
• Designing a better NHS with data
• Monitor me, data, health and technology
• Six steps to transform the way we do business
• Ushahidi: a story of non-linear innovation
• The web giants pumping us for data

 

Six steps to transform the way we do business

My article for The Guardian Sustainable Business

Based on the six principles of No Straight Lines

As the world becomes more complex, there is an urgent need to transform societies for a non-linear future

Our institutions, organisations and economies were conceived, designed and built for a simpler more linear world. Overwhelmed by complexity, these have become disrupted and unsustainable. There is an urgent need to transform our societies, organisations and economies by better design to thrive in what I call a "non-linear world". A non-linear world has significant implications for leadership, strategy, and innovation – the design of organisations and economic models as a whole.

A non-linear world is one in which we embrace the power and potential of complexity rather than trying to break it down into unconnected bits and that we see the world systemically. It is where we have the capacity and the tools (which already exist) to transform our organisations to work with the grain of human nature, not against it, that run leaner, more efficiently, and are greener. A non-linear world is a significant upgrade to our linear one, proving that better, much better, does not necessarily have to cost the Earth.

There are six framing principles as philosophy and practice of how to design organisations and economic models for a non-linear world:

Read full article

Location Is The Speedbump on Mobile Highway - Understanding how futile 'Location' is as a driver of any mobile service concept

I am regularly frustrated by the unwarranted hype and excitement around 'location' in mobile. The frustration comes from the fact that this issue has been studied ad nauseum and yet newcomers to mobile manage to reinvent the same tired ideas and peddle them as if they would shortly change the world. They won't. I have been writing the same article about why location is not the big opportunity in mobile for more than a decade now, and its time to do that again. Its not that location cannot give 'any' gains or benefits, there are some. But how to understand location's relevance, I think I now have the right metaphor. To use location in mobile services is similar to putting speedbumps for cars on the highway.

 

THE NUMBERS ARE NOT THERE

 

Location-based services (LBS) including LBS-based ads were launched in year 2000, so they are about 13 years of age. First LBS services included the apartment-hunter from Finland, the shopping mall LBS push ads from the USA and the LBS maps from Japan. The mobile data based media industry was invented only two years earlier, in 1998 when the first downloadable paid content for mobile was introduced. That was the ringing tone in Finland by Saunalahti (later Jippii, now part of Elisa). By year 2009 (12 years from launch), basic ringing tones were worth 5 Billion dollars according to Juniper Research. For context, the very basic ringing tones outsold global iTunes music by approximiately 2 to 1 that year.

Now lets look at location-based services. LBS based advertising was launched in year 2000. By 2012 total global LBS advertising services were worth 685 million dollars worldwide (ie 526 million Euros according to Berg Insight). So over a similar 12 year period, one service became 5 Billion dollars in value, the other only under 700 million in value. Basic, monophonic 'ploink-ploink' ringing tones managed to grow 7 times bigger than location-based advertisements.

So, lets be clear. Location-based advertising CAN grow. It HAS grown. But the average growth rate of non-messaging based mobile data (mobile media) is about 50% at an annual growth rate for the past five years. LBS is growing at perhaps 10% or 20% per year. It is THE worst-performing sector in all of mobile. If you do ringback tones. If you do MMS. If you do social networking. If you do music downloads. If you do coupons. If you do alerts. If you do augmented reality. Anything else in mobile grows more strongly than location-based services.

RISING TIDE RAISES ALL BOATS

Mobile has set the world record for fastest-ever growth from zero income to 1 Trillion dollars in annual value, achieved in only 29 years from the first commercial cellular mobile (car-phone) call in Tokyo Japan on NTT's network in 1979 (four years before the more famous Motorola phone was sold in Chicago by Ameritech). And 29 years later, the mobile industry breached 1 Trillion dollars in annual revenues (currently 1.4 Trillion). Note first, that many big industries we know well, like music, movies, gaming, radio, television, computers and the internet - have never grown this big. So yeah, mobile is far bigger than those industries. And that no Trillion-dollar sized industry has achieved it this fast, in only 29 years. So mobile has set the record, and is currently still, the strongest-growing giant industry on the planet.

Anything you do in mobile should grow. The point is, if you are not growing at the rate of the industry, you are underperforming! And LBS is consistently, chronically, dramatically underperforming. So yes, you can give me a stat of growth or of revenues. It may seem impressive by itself. But immediately when we compare it to any other forms of mobile data services, location-based services are exposed as pathetically bad.

Take advertising. The first mobile ad was served in 2000. It was an ad running on SMS text messaging, to fund the free headline news service on SMS (launched in Finland by MTV3 the television broadcaster). How did SMS text messaging based advertising do? eMarketer reported in 2009 that SMS text messaging based mobile advertising was worth 6.4 Billion dollars. Yes, you can do ads with LBS, in 12 years reaching a paltry 685 million, or you could do 9 times better in one quarter less the time, using SMS advertising. You see what I mean. A rising tide raises every boat. Even the worst, leaking, barely afloat boat will be raised by a rising tide. But you should not aim for the worst part of this industry, aim for strongest-growing parts.

LBS SPEED BUMP

So I think I have come up with a good analogy. LBS is like a speed bump in road-construction. Most of the time if you build a highway (to allow cars to drive fast from one town to another) you don't want speed bumps on it. Like cars, with mobile, most users will want the speed, they don't want to be slowed down. That doesn't mean there is 'no use' for speed bumps. We use speed bumps for example to slow cars down near schools, or other ways to slow down traffic, if for example there is road construction on our highway. In specialized cases, like race cars, some racing circuits insert 'slow-down zones' in terms of chicanes and hairpin turns, so that the race car drivers have more challenges, more opportunities to make mistakes and for good drivers to be able to pass lesser drivers, like they often do at Formula 1 race circuits, when the organizers notice that the cars are getting too fast for that circuit.

Yes, we can find specialized uses of speed bumps, but in most cases, most cases, they are a nuisance. Similarly LBS. If you give me a case example of any mass-market success of LBS, the success can be attributed to some other aspect, not the location. So LBS coupons? Yes. The gimmick here is coupon. You'll find that mobile coupons of almost any variety are growing at break-neck speed. You don't need 'location' to do successful coupons. Or the gamification of becoming the Mayor of Starbucks, via FourSquare. This is a game. Games are huge growth - just look at Angry Birds. Games are big, even location-based games can succeed (but at lesser rates than most popular mobile games that do not use the speed bumps of location). Or take Augmented Reality. Yes, plenty of AR is done with location information, but its by no means the only way to do AR. The powerful agent here is AR, not location.

PARCEL DELIVERY

So, lets take a perfect example. Parcel delivery. UPS has already launched the service that smartphone users can re-direct their package deliveries to where they are physically, at the time of delivery. So if you are not at home, because you are stuck at the office working late, or there was an emergency and you had to take one of your children to the hospital, etc, you can have the parcel delivered to where you are, not the original delivery address that was entered when the package was sent a few days ago. Brilliant, consumer-oriented service. And I think I saw a TV ad of FedEx doing something similar when I was in Toronto just now (only caught the end of the ad). This is a 'perfect' case of LBS. Obviously, parcels are physical items, and are delivered to a physical location. Isn't this a perfect location-based service?

No! No no no no no. Location is the speed bump again. Yes, its possible that I am at the intended location when the 'querie' is made as to where to deliver the parcel. Yes, its possible to use the GPS positioning on my smartphone to tell UPS or FedEx please deliver the parcel 'here' (wherever that may be, my home, my office, any other place). But its equally possible, that I am NOT where I want the parcel delivered!!! The power of mobile is to go beyond location! I could redirect that UPS package to where I am not now - I am now at home, but heading to the hospital, so 30 minutes later, I'd prefer the parcel delivered to the lobby at the hospital, not to my home. Or better yet, mobile can transcend location. I could re-direct the parcel to my sister's house on the same street, knowing she is at home. My smartphone cannot pinpoint my sister's location based on my phone's GPS sensor. But I can easily give the direction via an SMS or map, or simple mobile web address box, and type in my sister's house number on the same street. Why would you want to limit your 'service' to an explicit location, when mobile goes beyond location, to 'movement'. I can be freed from location, with mobile. Location is an artificial fence, an artificial jail for consumers. Mobile has the power to free us from borders and limits and locations!

 

And again, this may seem radically 'new' and bizarre to you, if you are relatively new to mobile, such as you discovered the mobile industry only in the iPhone era (year 2007 or after that). We have known. J-Navi, the location-based mapping and guidance service of J Phone in Japan (now Softbank) reported in 2001 that 30% of their map request by mobile phone users came for map information about some other location than where the phone was physically at !!! Guys, I am not inventing some new radical thought here! We've known this for more than a decade (those of us who bother to study this industry, not just spew some baseless drivel)

USE THE 9 UNIQUE ABILITIES

This is so frustrating to me. I know exactly where it comes from. It comes from the technology-geeks who look at the GPS sensor, see the personal location on a map, here is where I am. And next they think, hey, I could serve coupons and offers to the person near the store. This is so stupid. Mobile has 9 unique abilities that offer us the chance to deliver magical experiences, something never before possible on any tech including laptops and the legacy internet. Location is not one of the 9 unique abilities of mobile. Location existed in the third mass media - cinema. We can do location-based ads shown at the cinema 'after the movie if you want to have a nice dinner, come to Tony's Italian Restaurant two blocks from this cinema'. - these kinds of ads used to be very common back in the earlier days of movie advertising. And how supremely successful are they? Yeah. As trivial to cinema advertising as any LBS ad examples are to the overall mobile ad market. If Location-based ads were so hot and successful, we'd today see massive LBS ad market powering cinema and dwarfing television ads.

So what are the 9 unique aspects of mobile? The listing is:

1 - Mobile is the first (genuinely, and measurably) personal mass media
2 - Mobile is always carried

3 - Mobile is permanently connected
(these two are not the same, you can permanently carry a device that is not always connected - your wristwatch for example, and you can have a permanently connected device that is not always carried - like your home broadband internet connection)
4 - Mobile has a built-in payment system (note this includes both making payments and mobile can be a terminal for receiving payments)

5 - Mobile measures the audience most accurately

6 - Mobile is available at the point of inspiration

7 - Mobile captures the social context of consumption (ie our viral forwarding, our likes and follows, recommendations, which does not require purchase - I can recommend something even if I didn't buy it)

8 - Mobile enables Augmented Reality

9 - Mobile offers a digital interface to the real world

These nine abilities are the way to build successful mobile services. Location is not one of the unique abilities. Location is not even a 'useful' addition for most services. In many cases where location is used, the service could be better if location was abandoned, and in most cases where location is collected, the service would not suffer in any meaningful or measurable way, if location-collection was abandoned.

NICHE ONLY

Yes, there are niche uses where location is very important. The Blackberry Pocket Cop app, for example, allowing policemen to use Blackberries at work. It has all kinds of secure police uses including obviously secret messaging if the policeman is in a dangerous situation and cannot talk but needs to communicate. But yes, it also has the location-positioning of the police officer. This is very important if the police officer needs help, because he will not necessarily know the exact name of the street or cross-street or street number etc. But a location pin-pointing of his position can truly be life-saving feature, in a highly dangerous city like say Baltimore (one of the first where Pocket Cop was launched).

If you find yourself lost, then location-based accurate positioning is very useful. Yes, if you are driving your car in unfamiliar places, and find yourself lost - yes, an accurate positioning of your map is very useful. So specialized drivers - taxi drivers for example, who always drive to different places - will benefit from LBS based guidance on their car navigation systems. What about you and me? Did your office secretly shift to a new address last night? Did your children's school suddenly escape to another town? Did your home re-position to another suburb today while you were at work? No. Most of us do not find ourselves in unfamiliar places daily, weekly or even monthly. Once or twice per year we might go on vacation to an unfamiliar location. A few times we might venture to a strange part of town to some visit etc. But unless you are a jetsetting global James Bond, mostly we do not need the daily guidance in strange cities every day.

 

And if you set up a treasure-hunt type of game, like the rapper Jay Z's autobiography (released as a traditional printed book) where there were clues on every page for 300 treasure-hunt type of missions for fans to discover out of New York City, then yes. Locatino can make a difference. But thats about it.

SO LO NONSENSE

So we get SoLoMo, Social is great. Mobile is treat. But Location is sheer rubbish idea. If location was so powerful as a driver of commerce for example, why would retail worry about mobile. Traditional bricks-and-mortar stores are ultimately location-based. They say its all about 'location, location, location' in retail. Why would they worry about shoppers with mobile? Because mobile releases us from the binds of location! Because mobile frees us from location. Because mobile liberates us from the chains of location. Imagine being superman, able to fly, and then being chained to the earth. Thats what you get, if you force location to something that is mobile. You shackle it down like a prisoner.

Location only limits your business opportunity, it does not expand it. Take your location-based promotions. Say you are a florist and find yourself with sudden overstock of inventory of flowers. Flowers that don't last long. Someone had a wedding, but cancelled. You now have tons of flowers to sell. So you could blast the neighborhood with flower offers, get 12 roses for the price of 6, that kind of thing. And if you did use location-based ads, for example blasted to all within walking distance, no doubt you'll get some business out of it.

Here's the point. If you did the same ad - without the location-limitation - you'd get more sales. So why only limit sales to those who happen to be near you (but are not necessarily needing flowers). You annoy lots of people, to get some business. But why not rather have opt-in database for clients who shop with you? Now you can send the offer to all who already like your store, who have shopped with you before - and some happy Romeo can take his car, drive to your store, from quite far away, to buy say two dozen roses for the price of one dozen, to surprise his Juliet.

Location limits your reach. So its not just those within driving distance to your store. What about the James Bondian world traveller. He who has a nice secretary, his 'Moneypenny' back at the office. If he gets the alert while on a business trip to Germany, he could buy a bunch of roses, pay by credit card, and have them delivered as a spontaneous gift to the hard-working secretary back at the office. Location only limits your opportunity. Its like a speed bump on the highway. For most mobile services, location reduces your opportunity.

ORCA VS NARWHAL

I wrote at length about how the Romney vs Obama campaigns used data-mining. Romney did it the old-fashioned way, by zip codes, voting districts. His method was akin to location-based marketing. This voting district has a high proportion of Republican supporters, lets direct 'get-out-the-vote' type of activities like phone calls and reminders to that area.

Then there was Obama's campaign which yes, did of course know what district you were in, but its targeting was based not on location, but rather, on two scores of actual human behavior - the voter's preference ie supporter of Obama or supporter of Romney (individual voters identified and targeted this way) and get this - also each voter's likelihood to vote. So if you are a strong supporter of Obama (and have not voted yet on election day), you won't need the encouragement to vote. If you are very likely to vote that day (but have not yet voted) its no cause for concern at Obama headquarters, because they know you will (and any get-out-the-vote efforts would be wasted, because you would vote for Obama anyway). But the targets were the lukewarm supporters of Obama who were not sure if they would vote that day. Those types of voters would get calls and SMS reminders, even other Obama supporters would call them directly (as volunteers) with a nurse calling a nurse, a teacher calling a teacher, a military vet calling a military vet etc. This is the far FAR more powerful way to use (mobile) technology to achieve your ends.

Yes, Romney's campaign with location, could do something that was better than nothing. But what Obama did, with targeting, actual voter insights, and focused efforts (all to an opt-in database where voters had given permission to send messages from the campaign etc) gave Obama at least 3.5 million more votes than what he would have gotten if Team Obama had used traditional zip code/postal code/voting district type of - location-based - voter activation methods.

 

COUNTER-PRODUCTIVE

Mobile allows our service to be freed from tethering. Freed from the cable. Freed from the socket. Freed from proximity. Freed from short-range wireless even. Freed totally from location. Location-positioning is the very antithesis of what mobile can do. Its like building an airplane, then cutting off its wings. I am reminded of Gary Schwartz's excellent observation in his new book about use of mobile tech in retail: Fast Shopper, Slow Store. Gary explains why tablets are only ultra-portable digital devices, not as powerful as mobile phones and smartphones. Because mobile phones and smartphones can be operated single-handedly,.while doing other tasks. Tablets, on the other hand, in Gary's words 'immobilize consumers'. The tablet is very portable yes. But the moment you pull it out of your bag, and start to use the tablet, it will immobilize you. You want to be seated, you need to use both hands. Its very difficult to use a tablet while walking, and almost impossible to use it single handed. Most of the time with tablets, once we start to use them, we stop. We stop moving. We become immobilized. A tablet to mobility is like Kryptonite to Superman. The superpowers were there, but are now gone.

So, when you see millions (and even Billions) headed to some new start-ups and ventures that seek to revolutionize mobile through location, be warned. Tomi told you so, Tomi said years ago, that is not going to be big business. Be very careful and monitor the space.

If you see forecasts of huge growth projected for location, don't fall for the same trick! We had the exact same forecasts years and years ago. It never came. Don't be fooled by some clueless analyst promising a massive future. Look at his starting point data. What does the analyst say location is worth today. How many users today. How much revenue today. It is pitifully little. Then wait and see. If I am wrong, and suddenly after more than a decade of failure, location somehow does break free, then we must see real user and revenue numbers that are big. Revenues in the many Billions. Else, be smart. If the numbers are not there, learn the lesson, and put your money, your time, your project resources into any other part of mobile, where it will give you better returns than it would in location.

And please please please do not write that 'now' is somehow different. No, GPS on iPhones today in America is no different from GPS on early KDDI phones in Japan in 2002. Yes, Japan had GPS based location services a decade ago. Don't say maps make a difference or 3D rendering of cities. Japan had all that by the middle of the last decade, yet KDDI itself - who essentially invented and launched almost all modern LBS concepts from LBS-based ads to LBS-based treasure hunts to LBS-based maps - say that of their whole service portfolio, LBS is the worst-performing part.

Context is good. Context is useful. Context can include elements like time, and the users 'status' of being at work or at home. Context can have dozens of elements that can help us identify and target services to help our consumers. And within the area of Context, location can be used as one element (distinct from say, proximity). Location can be used as an input to derive other benefits such as movement. We can measure speeds of traffic based on the measured positions of individual phones on a highway, and measured over a few minutes of time. Across many phones (as those inside cars moving on that road) we can calculate very accurately the average speeds sustained on that road, to determine for example if there is road congestion this morning, etc. Context-based services I can see becoming big over time. And location may be one of dozens of inputs. But don't plan on launching location-based services for the masses. They never turn out big.

 

Rare National Smartphone Market Data via Mary Meeker - Analyzed further and reported also Per Capita + Bonus! Estimate of regional smartphone new sales market sizes for 2013

We have fresh smartphone penetration rate data across major countries! I've meant to do this for a while but its been busy, but still, as these are new numbers on very rare info, I want to share it with all.

 

Mary Meeker we all know, the goddess of all internet stats, who often gives very good mobile related numbers too. She has in her latest numbers included a table of the 30 biggest countries by their smartphone population in use (see Slide number 7). So, these are the 30 countries who had at least 6 million or more smartphones in use by Q4 of 2012, ie at the end of the year. I should immediately point out, that several of the traditional smartphone leaders in terms of penetration rate are countries whose population is so small, they can't fit onto this table, ie Finland, Norway, Denmark (each with a population of 5 million), Singapore, Ireland, New Zealand (each with a population of 4 million). And the UAE with 8 million, is probably very near the 31st country on her list of Top 30, as the UAE has recently been reported with about 75% smartphone penetration, being right there at the cut-off point of 6 million smartphones in use... But lets ignore the 'small countries' and look at the countries whose national population is typically over 10 million (or near it, Hong Kong at 7 million, Sweden at 8 million). Which countries currently have the largest populations of smartphones in use?

I have taken Mary's data and added the relevant country population data (she published hers with the interesting - but misleading - statistic of "smartphones as percent of all mobile subscribers". That may seem 'logical' until you notice that Canada has under 100% mobile penetration while Hong Kong has over 200% penetration rate in mobile subscriptions. That measure allows for hideously misleading interpretations. So by her measure, Canada and Hong Kong appear almost equal in their 'smartphone migration' rate, whereas if we compare 'per capita' to the human population alive in the country, Hong Kong has almost exactly twice as high reach of smartphones in use per capita, as has Canada. So I am using of course the smartphone per capita statistic as the measure for rankings in this table:

 

Smartphone Penetrations in countries that have over 6 million smartphones in use:

 

COUNTRY . . . POPULATION . . . SMARTPHONES . . . SMARTPHONES PER CAPITA

 

Hong Kong . . . . . 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85%

 (Note: Singapore and Macau track very close to Hong Kong)

Sweden . . . . . . . 9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 85%

 (Note: Finland, Norway, Denmark and Iceland track very close to Sweden)

Australia . . . . . 22 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72%

 (Note: New Zealand tracks very close to Australia)

South Korea  . . 48 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66%

Japan . . . . . . . 126 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62%

UK. . . . . . . . . . . 62 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56%

 (Note: Ireland tracks very close to UK)

Netherlands . . . 17 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54%

 (Note: Switzerland and Austria usually track hear Netherlands)

USA . . . . . . . . 320 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 172  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54%

Saudi Arabia . . 28 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53%

 (Note: UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain and Qatar track usually well ahead of Saudi Arabia)

Canada . . . . . . 34 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44%

France . . . . . . . 63 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41%

Malaysia . . . . . 29 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41%

Spain . . . . . . . . 46 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39%

Italy . . . . . . . . . 61 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31%

Taiwan . . . . . . . 23 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30%

Germany . . . . . . 82 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30%

Brazil . . . . . . . . 201 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 55 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27%

Argentina . . . . . . 42 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26%

Poland . . . . . . . . 38 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23%

South Africa. . . . 52 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21%

Thailand . . . . . . . 71 . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20%

China . . . . . . . 1,482 . . . . . . . . . . . . 270 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18%

Turkey . . . . . . . . 75 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17%

Philippines . . . . . 96 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16%

Russia . . . . . . . . 147 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15%

Mexico . . . . . . . 117 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13%

Indonesia . . . . . 247 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11%

Egypt . . . . . . . . . 84 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8%

India . . . . . . . 1,261 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3%

 

Source: TomiAhonen Consulting Analysis from Mary Meeker & Informa data, and UN population statistics, April 2013

This data may be freely shared

 

So when we add the 'usual suspect' smaller countries like Singapore, Finland, New Zealand, Switzerland etc, we get 22 countries already where smartphone penetration rate is past 50% per capita. And by now, April of 2013, we have just about 10 countries where there is a smartphone for three quarters of the population - Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Iceland, Australia and New Zealand. Previously (but not verified by these Mary Meeker numbers) we also heard that the UAE had passed 75% smartphone penetration by early 2012, so we should also have Bahrain, Kuwait and Qatar with more than 75% smarpthone penetration, so very likely the count is 14 (mostly small, and obviously very affluent) countries.

 

WORLD MARKET FOR SMARTPHONES 2013

 

Last year the world saw 695 million smartphones sold (almost twice the number of all types of PCs, and about four out of every ten mobile phones sold overall). This year we will see about 1 Billion new smartphones sold. How are those split regionally? I used the Mary Meeker numbers to determine year 2012 installed base regionally - her numbers accounted for 88% of all smartphones in use. I then used a population-adjusted model to fill in the missing national penetrations, by region. And then used a growth estimator for the different regions, based on how high their current installed base and migration rate is, obviously in the West we do not see heavy growth rates anymore in smartphones, the growth is mild, while in the Emerging World the growth rates are huge. So with that, I got this mix of the regional split of the global smartphone market for 2013. This is new sales of smartphones this year, 2013, split by region:

 

 

Source: TomiAhonen Consulting Analysis April 2013, projected from Mary Meeker Q4 2012 data and other smartphone market sources including TomiAhonen Phone Book 2012

This picture may be freely shared

 

Note, as the market is expected to be very near exactly 1 Billion new smartphones sold this year, you can take those numbers and convert multiply the percentages by 10 to get the number sold. So for China, 27% means 270 million smartphones this year as the Chinese market size, and for North America 13% means 130 million smartphones sold etc. Yes, China alone this year will see approximately twice as many new smartphones sold as in all of North America. And Asia accounts for almost exactly half of all new smartphones sold this year, led by China, but including the rich parts of Asia like Japan, South Korea, Hong Kong etc, and then the Emerging World parts of the 'Rest of Asia' ie India, Sri Lanka, Vietnam, Indonesia, Philippines etc etc etc. Half of all smartphones sold this year will go to Asia.

 

FOR MATH GEEKS

 

And for those who want to do their own math at home, haha.. Here are the multipliers you can get rough estimates of quarterly market sizes, if you know the full year sales level (at 1 Billion for this year):

 

Q1 = 21% = 210 million in 2013

Q2 = 22% = 220 million in 2013

Q3 = 25% = 250 million in 2013

Q4 = 32% = 320 million in 2013

TOTAL = 100% = 1 Billion smartphones in 2013

(This are based on 2012 numbers, expecting the ratio to be very similar this year, with the exception of if there is a major economic collapse that suddenly kills sales).

So with those numbers, you can for example see, that the US market for smartphones in Q1 was about (using the formula: 210 million x 13% = 27.3) so 27.3 million actual units of smartphones sold. So as market data, we know from Nokia Q1 results this past week, that Nokia sold 400,000 units of smartphones in North America in Q1, so Nokia's smartphone market share would be 1.4% in North America right now, including all Windows Phone Lumia and the random last Symbian unit, combined. As a sanity check, when we examine Kantar February 2013 numbers from their market data analysis of the US market, they suggest Nokia Symbian and Windows Phone should have 4.2% of the US smartphone market, that would suggest 33% of the US market for Windows Phone was held by Nokia in Q1, and 67% went to the rivals on Windows Phone platform like HTC and Samsung. So the other stronger brands in the US market would have sold approximately 800,000 Windows Phone handsets, which again would be consistent with the level of sales that is non-Nokia on a global level, with Windows Phone (as we heard, those manufacturers shrunk or ended their marketing of Windows Phone for non-US markets in Q4). When we look at the MKM intent to buy survey also for the US right now, they had 0.7% of US consumers willing to buy a Nokia Lumia smartphone. If half of US phones sold roughly speaking now are smarpthones, that is again consistent with 1.4% smartphone market share.

 

As a second sanity check, lets take another major market and another brand. Lets look at China and Lenovo. The math suggests Chinese market to be about (Formula: 270 million x 21% in Q1 = 56.7) so 56.7 million units right now. Lenovo said in Q4 that almost all of their sales were still from China as they were just entering Russia, India, etc. So if we look at Lenovo's Q4 sales at 9.4 million, it suggests a 16.5% market share if that level continued to now. Strategy Analytics reported that for the full year sales, Lenovo's China market share was 13%. Again, reasonably close, allowing for Lenovo's rapid growth, its annual average (13%) would have to be by necessity lower than its current level (16%). Again the sanity check is very strong, that these numbers are good estimates.

So there you have it, national penetration rates for 30 countries reported in absolute numbers and as penetration rate per capita. I've added a dozen more smaller countries via their proxies, to indicate where we might find Norway or Macau or Kuwait etc. And based on those numbers, I've calculated the market size estimators updated for 2013, for the regional/continental market sizes for smartphone sales this year. All data on this blog obviously free to use, and free to share and feel free to create better tables, graphics etc from the above data.

For those who want much more in handset data, please see my TomiAhonen Phone Book 2012. And for those who may need to plan for the future, you may want to see the projections on over 100 data points into the next few years, by the most accurate forecaster in the mobile industry. See my TomiAhonen Mobile Forecast 2012-2015 if that might be of use.

When No means No? What part of No do Nokia and Microsoft not understand? US Consumers Reject Lumia at 96% Rate says Latest Survey (Corrected)

There is an alternate fantasy world, that Nokia CEO Stephen Elop and Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer push to unsuspecting reporters. It is bolstered by fabricated numbers, bizarre anomalies and continuously unsubstantiated claims of big surges and market recoveries 'just around the corner'.

...And then there is reality.

The strongest reality of how Microsoft's Windows Phone OS, including WP8, and the related Nokia Lumia series of smartphones can do in the future - is consumer 'intent to buy' surveys reflecting both loyalty and interest. Here the story is brutal and consistent. We heard from intent-to-buy surveys in Europe in late 2011 that Lumia was not going to sell more than 2% in early European launches - almost exactly what it ended up doing. Then we heard from Chinese surveys of intent-to-buy that Nokia share was collapsing in 2011 and it did. And so forth. That was early. What about after the consumers got to play with the Lumia and new Windows Phone 7.5? Then we had the Yankee Group survey of Lumia owners in the USA, and the Bernstein survey of US and UK smartphone owners. Again. Brutal. Four out of ten Lumia owners rated it the worst phone possible. Two out of three Windows Phone current owners will never buy another again! This is absolute concrete evidence that this Microsoft-based system cannot thrive. If actual independent surveys of consumer opinions who own the devices are this dismal.

And on those 'but they get the best ratings on Amazon' bullshit peddled by Microsoft and Nokia defenders. Haha, no. We KNOW now how that was done, it was the Dirty Tricks department of Microsoft, now also used by Nokia, and their trolls, who rushed to spam all review sites with masses of unsubstantiated glowing reviews by supposed new owners - at ridiculous review rates at the launch of new phones - and by reviewers with no history of other reviews. They were plants, they were paid for, they were Microsoft smoke-and-mirrors squad who were behind those fake news. No, the independent reviews of actual Windows Phone users overall, and of actual Lumia users at the Nokia side - have been consistently horrid. Consumers hate the smartphone at unprecedented levels. Yes, there is the occasional customer who loves it, but most hate it, which is why retail sales pricing collapses weeks after new launches, and why resale values of Lumia series are in the toilet, and Nokia Lumia return rates are the highest recorded in Nokia history.

 

The Windows propaganda machine says 'but the newest release will fix all that'. We've heard it time and again. So once again, Nokia Lumia first edition, on Windows Phone 7.5 (and its dead-end migration path to WP 7.8) was a failure, yes. But this will 'all be forgotten' and 'all will be well' on Windows Phone 8, that just launched. Look at all the glowing reviews and how great it is. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. We've heard this story so many times, we have to have learned by now. So, Tomi, do you have 'proof' that Windows Phone - version 8 - is a market failure then?

LATEST MKM CONSUMER SURVEY 

Yes we do. MKM has JUST released a consumer survey that discusses very specifically Windows Phone version 8. The survey was part of their consumer survey of mobile phone brands in the USA, covering 1,500 US consumers (and before you bitch about the number - that is a large consumer survey, statistically relevant, usually consumer surveys of more than 1,000 respondents is considered very reliable - if you don't know why, go take a basics 101 course in marketing research and statistics).

MKM found that US consumers love their iPhones and Androids, and intend to buy more Samsungs, Apples - predictable stuff. But lets drill down and see what MKM found out about Windows Phone and Nokia. Remember the movie Glengarry Glenn Ross? The one with Al Pacino as the ace salesman who sells worthless land in Florida, the movie with Jack Lemmon, Alan Arkin and Ed Harris among the other sales guys, and Alec Baldwin delivers one of the most memorable monologues in cinema history - "You see this watch? this watch costs more than your car." and "This month's sales contest first prize is a Cadillac. Wanna see second prize? A set of stake knives. Third prize is you're fired." (there were four salesguys so two would be fired by the end of the month) And the classic "ABC, Always Be Closing. Always. Be closing..." (perhaps the greatest movie about sales ever, written by Mamet)

 

Anyway, Alec Baldwin discusses the two golden rules of sales, ABC and AIDA. ABC we saw, AIDA is Attention, Interest, Decision and Action. As Alec says "Attention. Do I have your attention, I know I do, because its fuck or walk. You close or you hit the bricks." (translation: you sell or you are fired). And so forth, I love that movie. Anyway, do American consumers pay attention to Windows Phone and Nokia? The survey said that 6.4% of smartphone owners ie 3.2% of all respondents had a Windows based smartphone, and 1.6% of all phone owners (3.2% of smartphone owners) had a Nokia branded handset. You would therefore expect that the awareness of Nokia's newest version of its OS would be known at something like those levels, and same is true overall of Microsoft and Windows. Attention. Do I have your intention? The survey found that 19% of respondents (ie 38% of smartphone owners) knew that Nokia has its new OS now as Windows Phone version 8.

Bearing in mind that half of respondents do not own smartphones, and of those who do, the loyalty with iPhone and Android is very strong, this 19% of all US consumers, 38% of smartphone owners is a VERY strong number for Attention. It is incredibly strong, considering how poorly Nokia is used by US phone owners - only 1.6% of all respondents actually own a Nokia phone. Attention? Do I have your attention? Yes, Nokia launched Lumia - as CEO Elop promised - with the world's largest phone launch budget of all time, by a wide margin - over 3 times more money thrown at Lumia than the previous biggest launch ever. And that was then added to, by Microsoft's biggest-ever marketing support of its smartphone marketing, and that, added to by the carriers often doing their biggest launches ever. In the USA specifically, AT&T said its Lumia launch support was also its biggest phone marketing push of all time.

So 1.7% of US consumers own a Nokia phone, and only 3.2% of US consumers had any Windows Phone branded smartphone by any manufacturer, but a massive 19% know now - only months from launch - that Nokia has Windows Phone 8 available. This is what over-saturated marketing can achieve. There is nothing more to give. Marketing has done its job. Those who don't know either are utterly not in the smartphone market at all, or are already fully committed to some other brand and fiercely loyal to it (think iPhone owners standing in line overnight for their next iToy).

Understand what this means. It means, that no matter how many more Billions of money is thrown after Lumia marketing now, the attention of any conceivable addressable market has already been reached. There is nothing more that can be done by more 'marketing'. So lets move to Glengarry Glen Ross and Alec Baldwin's part 2 in AIDA. After Attention: Interest. Are you interested? And we have MKM asking that explicit question about Windows Phone. While only 3.2% currently have Windows Phone on their smartphone, but 36% said yes, they ware interested in Windows Phone. Again, the over-saturation of marketing and media has done its job. 

Now, one in three Americans are intersted in Windows Phone devices, one in five Americans knows Nokia's Lumia series runs the latest Windows Phone 8 software. Currently 3.2% of Americans have any Windows Phone and 1.6% have a Nokia branded phone. How well is this interest and attention being tranlsated into sales. Third in the AIDA formula is Decision. As Alec Baldwin asks the salesmen being threatened to be fired - have your made your decision, for Christ? (meaning to go out and sell tonight, to try to keep their jobs). The numbers are low, this huge level of interest and attention, the future purchase intention HAS to be better. They know about Windows Phone 8, they have experience with past Windows, they HAVE to want the newer better system? Right? 

Wrong.

 

MKM survey of what phone US consumers intend to buy next, finds that while 1.6% own a Nokia, 19% know Nokia has Windows Phone 8 now available, only 0.7% are willing to buy one. Yes. That is right. Less than one percent of US consumers have found the propaganda-brainwashing machine by Microsoft, AT&T and Nokia to be compelling enough, that they would be willing to actually buy a Lumia running Windows Phone 8.

 

ZERO POINT SEVEN PERCENT

Yes, 0.7% only. So lets start with Nokia US loyalty. Windows Phone was supposed to resurrect Nokia in the USA. This idiotic idea was pushed by Elop, when he abandoned the far bigger and faster-growing Chinese market - where Nokia held over 60% market share in smartphones and the highest loyalty of all smartphones - to pursue the far smaller US market where both Nokia and Microsoft were weak players at the time. Today China's market for Nokia has collapsed, is under 5%. Nokia before this silly Eloppian micromadness held 4% of the US market, it is now yes, 2%. After a year of selling Lumia, Nokia is still selling LESS in North America than it did before this idiotic plan was hatched by the Twin Evil Stevies and their microbrains.

But will Windows Phone 8 save Nokia and Microsoft now? No. Of EXISTING Nokia smartphone owners, those last suffering and most loyal fanatics that are left, when they see Windows Phone 8, they are running away at the rate of 55%. Yes more than HALF of all who still own a Nokia smartphone, after seeing Windows Phone 8, and based on their current Nokia (mostly Lumia but also some Symbian) experiences, looking at Windows Phone 8 - 55% of current Nokia smartphone owners say - never again.

THIS IS FAILURE

What part of No can you not understand, Nokia? What part of No, can you not understand, Microsoft? Oh, wanna see misery? Microsoft Windows home market is the USA. MKM asked US consumers are you interested in Windows on your smarpthone - this is Microsoft's home - and 64% said No! This is, and I quote Alec Baldwin from Glengarry Glen Ross, so I apologize for the foul language, but this is so clearly the point: "You can't close the leads you're given, you can't close shit, you are shit, hit the bricks pal and beat it 'cause you are going out." 

All Americans know Microsoft and Windows. Two thirds of Americans have such a poisoned view out of personal experience with the Evil Empire, two thirds of Americans say to Microsoft, stay away from my phones! This is such enormous hostility that Windows can never become the third ecosystem, if your best market hates you this passionately. But yes, lets move on to the cruncher.

96% WHO UNDERSTAND IT, HATE IT

This is the key finding for anyone in any way interested in Microsoft, Windows, Windows Phone, Windows smarpthones, Nokia, Lumia, Nokia smartphones and the Nokia-Microsoft 'partnership'. 19% of Americans are not just interested in Windows Phone, but know that Nokia's latest Lumia series has Windows Phone 8 on it - yet only 0.7% are willing to buy one. It means, of those who know of this actual Nokia-Microsoft offering, 96% of US consumers who truly do understand it and know it - reject it! This percentage is now lower even than the horrid Symbian-to-Windows consumer loss that I reported here from previous consumer surveys last year. You remember this graph?

This graphic may be freely shared (note, this graphic is on previous consumer surveys, does not include this, even worse MKM survey now reported)

Yes, based on PREVIOUS stats, Nokia lost 93% of its loyal customers attempting the transition. Now, the future with Windows Phone 8 says that 96% reject Nokia. This is NOT a company that is 'improving' - this is a company going in the wrong direction, the customers are still abandoning the proposition.

When Bill Gates was in charge of Microsoft, the Windows smartphone market share was second best in the world (behind Nokia's Symbian obviously) and reached a peak of 12% market share about five years ago..  With Steve Ballmer in charge, bullying the ecosystem and scaring Microsoft carrier-partners, Windows smartphone market share had fallen to 5% by 2010. That is when Ballmer convinced his Nokia-pal and ex employee Stephen Elop to abandon the world's largest smartphone OS - when Nokia had GROWN smartphone sales in year 2010 by 52% in just that year, and grown more than Apple or RIM or Samsung - yes its true please check the numbers, Nokia grew more in 2010 than famed Apple, Samsung or RIM - and Nokia did this with Symbian, and did it highly profitably, with the smartphone unit profits increasing towards the end of the year, not diminishing. Nokia towered so far bigger than its nearest rivals, more than twice as big as number two - that Toyota, General Motors have never had such market lead in cars, IBM, HP or Dell (or Apple) have never had such dominance in PCs, etc. This all Elop threw away, to hop in bed with Ballmer and the Microsoftian Misadventure. What happened?

We heard the story. Sony said there is no demand by carriers for Windows Phone and abandoned the platform to focus on Android where all the demand is. Dell said there is no demand for Windows Phone and actually quit smartphones altogether. Motorola said there is no demand for Windows Phone and quit the platform only doing Android. Now again, we heard this February from LG that there is no demand for Windows Phone, and they are not bothering to launch Windows Phone smartphones doing Android instead. Samsung said the same, they now are launching Tizen for which there is big demand by carriers, and continuing with Android, but not doing Windows for there is no demand.

So yes. What happened? Major analyst companies like Gartner, IDC, MIC, Strategy Analytics promised us Windows Phone would have magically recovered to 15% or so by 2012, and clueless Pyramid talked of 25% or better market share for Windows supposedly passing even the iPhone by now. We know the story. Before this Nokia partnership, Nokia had 34% market share and Microsoft had 5% in 2010. In 2011, a year when Nokia mostly sold its suddenly 'Osborned' Symbian phones, its market share collapsed at a world-record speed falling to 16%. Yes, this was literally the worst collapse in handset history, including famed market collapses of the past such as Motorola, Palm and Siemens. How did Microsoft do as it waited for the first Nokia Lumia phones to be launched? Windows smartphone market share fell to 2% in 2011.

Ok, that was 'to be expected' as we awaited the saviour-phones, the superphones, the Lumias running the promised super OS by Microsoft, the brand new awesome Windows Phone 7.5 that Microsoft finally launched in late 2011. How did this partnership do in 2012? Nokia took its world-record-setting collapse of 2011, and managed to out-do it, by an even worse year, setting the newest worst-ever year in handset market collapse, falling from 16% market share to 5%. Yes. Stephen Elop created the world-record collapse of a market leader (by the way, this is not just in phones, it is actually the world record for ANY industry, cars, airplanes, TV sets, PCs, soft drinks, whatever industry you want, THE world record collapse in one year, actually) - and he then managed to follow up with an even worse world-record once again. And is there a silver lining to this? Did this 'sacrifice' and massacre of Nokia's market share result in corresponding gains to Windows? What was Microsoft's Windows smartphone market share last year? 2%

 

TWO PERCENT !!!

 

Before this partnership was announced, their separate market shares totalled 39% (34% Nokia, 5% Microsoft). Now after the Nokia Symbian migration is essentially complete, as we heard from Nokia at the last Quarterly results - what was this partnership's combined market share for year 2012? 5.4% (Nokia 5% and Microsoft 2% but 80% of the Microsoft sales were by Nokia). Microsoft before being poisoned by Nokia, had 5% market share, it now in 2012 had 2%. Microsoft before Windows Phone on Lumia launched, had 2% market share in 2011, after Nokia joined in, Microsoft's market share in 2012 was unchanged at 2%. This is total comprehensive failure by Microsoft.

For Nokia it is worse. Before Microsoft Nokia towered over its rivals, grew 52% in one year in smartphones, made huge profits in smartphones and had the highest consumer loyalty in the biggest markets such as China where it commanded 60% market share!!!! By 2012 after all the bad-will of the Microsoft misadventure - remember even Americans hate Windows so much, two out of three hate the idea of Windows on a smarpthone - Nokia's market share went into the toilet and was 5% for the year - and get this - its down to 3% by Q4 of 2012, so it kept crashing even as Windows Phone 8 was being launched at the time.

This is total comprehensive failure of the Windows experiment. I could have told you so, in fact I did tell you so. I was the most accurate forecaster of Nokia (by a massive margin over the next-most-accurate forecaster) and I was the most accurate forecaster of Windows (again, by a massive margin over number 2) for this silly journey. And I have reported here faitfully all major consumer surveys of this platform. And they keep promising us, that the next Windows version will cure all the problems. Oh? Windows Phone 8 was supposed to finally fix all the problems and finally be the answer to all that was troubling this partnership. Well, now we know. 

MKM survey of US consumers finds that two in five smartphone owners knows that Nokia Lumia has this new Windows Phone 8 as its system. Yet of all who know it, 96% say they will not buy Nokia Lumia with the new WP8. Even of those last remaining vestiges of loyal Nokia owners, their experiences with Windows Phone have been so bad, that 55% of current Nokia smartphone owners in America refuse to buy another Lumia again, even as they have seen Windows Phone 8. Windows Phone 8 will not save Nokia. No, this platform is dead.

ACTING IN NOKIA'S BEST INTEREST

So, Nokia? All other Windows smartphone manufacturers have said that there is no demand for Windows Phone, or the demand is so weak, they don't bother to release new Windows Phone products. Even Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop has said that many carriers hate Lumia not because its a bad phone, but because they hate it that Microsoft owns Skype, that there is a reseller boycott that is against all Windows Phone manufacturers. Elop explained this at the Annual Shareholder's Meeting for Nokia last year. And departed Nokia Lumia execs have said so, and departed Microsoft Windows Phone execs have said so, that there is no demand - or that there is actually an active carrier/reseller boycott even, against Nokia and against Windows Phone. Elop has complained bitterly many times, that Lumia does not get resale support, that the phones are in the stores but the sales staff are not selling them (and remember, the Lumia series has a Nokia-record rejection rate/return rate and thus the sales staff obviously hate selling it). This retail 'reluctance' (if you don't like my word 'boycott') against Nokia has been verified in countless checks in countries from USA to UK, from Finland to France, from Canada to China. Again, its not that silly Tomi Ahonen has invented this problem - Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop has said countless times that the problem is at the carries and retail sales.

The REASON why Nokia's sterling credit rating when Elop took over - yes, Nokia was rated by S&P, by Moody's and by Fitch all as one notch below PERFECT, this at the time of global economic crisis when most Nokia rivals were reporting losses - the reason why those credit ratings downgraded Nokia, was not because the Lumia or Windows phones were bad, it was because there was no carrier support, the retail support was lacking. The ratings agencies listed this problem as the reason at EVERY downgrade, often as their only reason or the biggest reason. And you know the story, Nokia was downgraded so many times, today all three ratings agencies list Nokia as junk!!! Not because Windows Phone or Lumia are bad phones, its because the retail and carriers refuse to sell it.

So your retail refuses to sell your product. The consumers who have tried your new product hate it, refuse to buy more, and are returning it at record levels. The newest version is rejected by 96% of those who see it. What part of No do you not understand, Nokia?

Samsung is the world's largest smartphone maker. They also sell Windows Phone based smartphones. They are not foolish to make the world's most undesirable smartphone their only platform. They of course sell on Android and bada and are about to launch on Tizen. Huawei is the world's third largest smartphone maker. They also sell Windows Phone based smartphones. They are not foolish enoguh to make the world's most undesirable smartphone their only platform. Huawei sells most of its smarpthones on Androi and will launch smarpthones on Firefox and on Tizen. ZTE is the world's fourth largest smartphone maker. They also sell on Windows Phone. They are not foolish enough to make the world's most undesirable smartphone OS their only platform. ZTE sell on Android and will launch on Firefox too. Lenovo is the world's fifth largest smartphone maker. They do not bother with the world's most undesirable smartphone platform, they only do Android. Sony is the world's sixth largest smartphone maker, they used to sell Windows based smartphones too, but after they noticed its the most undesirable platform out there, Sony quit it and now only sell on Android. LG is the world's seventh largest smartphone maker. They also are part of the Windows partnership but found that there is no demand for Windows so they only do Android and will also expand to offer Firefox based smartphones. LG recently bought Palm WebOS as another more viable OS than Windows. HTC is the world's eighth-largest smartphone maker, and the launch partner for Microsoft's smartphones a decade ago. HTC has noticed the demand for Windows based smartphones is weak and thus has shifted most of its production away from Windows to Android.

Every rational, sensible smartphone maker, who is in the Windows camp, has concluded that because Windows has no strong demand, they need another platform - and EVERY smartphone maker who is in the Windows camp, actually DOES sell more ON THE OTHER PLATFORM.

Nokia was the biggest smartphone maker, it is now in tenth place. Of all smarpthone makers in the Windows partnership, Nokia is the only one that insists on putting all its eggs in this one broken basket. Nokia is the only one that refuses to sell phones on any other platform. Even as it sees, clearly, that its consumers are rejecting the offering. Even when compared to clearly obsolescent Symbian - come on, you'd think ANYTHING is better than Symbian - even when offered the chance to migrate away from Symbian, to take Windows Phone, Nokia lost 93% of those it tried to migrate over the past year or so. And of those who remain, two out of three hate Lumia so much, they will never buy another. Nokia would have a plethora of options, the totally license-free Android, the world's most popular smartphone platform - and Google was begging Nokia to join its platform two years ago. They'd love to have Nokia come onboard now. Or if not Google, there is Mozilla's Firefox, there is Intel's and Samsung's Tizen. There is the African Ubuntu project and there is the Sailfish OS, an evolution of Nokia's own projects in the past. Blackberry had said it is open to licence the BB10 OS, which is getting better response than Windows Phone by that same MKM survey now. 

And thats before we think of Nokia's OWN smartphone operating systems. (Nokia has to pay a royalty to Microsoft, but Nokia's own OS platforms are of course royalty-free to Nokia!!!) Yes, Symbian is old, but even the old OS managed to provide magnificent award-winning tech, like that on the 808 Pureview that won all cameraphone awards last year. Yes, running on Symbian! I am not suggesting going back to Symbian, obviously but there is MeeGo and Maemo, two Linux based operating systems that Nokia developed, Maemo totally in-house and MeeGo with Intel. MeeGo is the only OS up to now, that in side-by-side user tests, across the planet (in those miniscule markets where Elop dared to release the N9 phone) was rated BETTER than the iPhone !!! Who makes a smartphone and an operating system BETTER than the iPhone? And what moron CEO refuses to release phones on that system?

And before you have time to say 'but but but' - used - 2 year old used - USED smartphones on an 'obsolete' OS, MeeGo, the rare QWERTY slider-variant to the N9, the N950 (the ultimate QWERTY keyboard smartphone of all time) - are now selling for obscene amounts. One N950 just sold for 2,000 US dollars on Ebay (1,499 Euros) - oh, and thats not the peak they've paid. Think about that for a moment, all you iPhone-fanatics. You want your 650 dollar iPhone 5 on a contract so you can get it for 179 dollars? And some weirdo takes a similarly valued (at the time estimated retail price range for N950 in 2011 wasa about 600 Euros) and pays 2,000 dollars for a two-year-old touch-screen/QWERTY-slider Nokia on that MeeGo operating system? Yeah. MeeGo the OS that was regularly rated better than the iPhone. Not Tomi's silly words here, some phone fanatics will go buy them at astronomical prices even when used - yet Elop refuses to let Nokia sell it anywhere??? And while the world would love more MeeGo phones that would sell at huge profit margins, Elop insists instead to push Lumia. By the Nokia smartphone unit that currently generates a 20% loss per Lumia phone sold? What is wrong with this picture? 

 

Especially, if your current system is rejected by existing customers at the rate of 93% and new potential customers at the rate of 96%. There is no management logic to Stephen Elop. He is a Microsoft mole. He is so desperate now, he is embarrassing himself and Nokia by for example throwing a TV interviewer's personal iPhone across the room in a TV interview. He is pathetic for suggesting that owning an iPhone is somehow 'embarrassing' - it being the world's most beloved and highest-loyalty (and most expensive) smartphone.

If Elop was acting in Nokia's best interest, he would understand that Nokia loyal customers are now abandoning Nokia not because Nokia's hardware tech is suddenly bad, its because Windows Phone is comprehensively failing in the market. An authority no less than Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates has said that the original launch of Windows on smartphones was working fine, but then Ballmer messed it up so badly that the current Windows strategy cannot succeed. It has no chance of succeeding. Not my words, that is how Microsoft's Chairman described Windows smartphones currently. When this platform is not working, the smart thing is to offer customers some choice on some other platform. That is what EVERY one of the other Windows manufacturers is now doing, after they saw that Windows Phone had no support and didn't produce loyal customers. The only clueless f*ck CEO who refuses this very basic MBA 101 course logic, is Stephen Elop, who rather, when he HAD four smartphone OS platforms, killed all three that were popular and loved by Nokia users, and now insists on continuing with the platform that is most hated of all smartphone OS platforms out there. Yes. Windows Phone is the least loved, most hated, smartphone platform in production. No other Windows partner is foolish enough to put all their eggs in this broken basket. But Elop is. This is yet more proof that Elop is not acting in Nokia's best interest and must be fired immediately. And the Board for not firing him sooner, is clearly incompetent and must have its purge as well.

 

(Note - this article had a mistaken reference to a Kantar market survey in its first version, where I accidentially compared UK statistics to US statistics. I apologize. The mistaken reference has been removed)

The Annual Mobile Industry Numbers and Stats Blog - Yep, this year we will hit the Mobile Moment..

So its that time again. I just finished the 2013 edition of the TomiAhonen Almanac, my annual statistical volume on the status of the mobile industry, and as usual, to celebrate that publication, I will do the big update to all the mobile numbers. You may want to bookmark this page for future reference

MOBILE NOW 6.7 BILLLION ACCOUNTS

So the monster number first. The global count of active mobile subscriptions reached 6.7 Billion at the end of 2012, and yes, this summer we will hit the 'mobile moment' ie that point in time when for the first time ever on this planet, a consumer technology will match the human population in size. The planet has 7.1 Billion people and as we grew subscriptions 14% last year, its rather clear we will hit that 7.1 Billion number around the summer of 2013. What was the penetration rate per capita at the end of last year? 93.7%. And there is no stopping that growth, don't listen to those who once again suggest that we are 'near saturation'. Hogwash! Several countries, led by Hong Kong are past 200% mobile penetration rate per capita. This growth is not stopping anytime soon.

So lets dig in. What does 6.7 Billion mobile subscriptions mean, then? They are not in reality all individual unique users, as we well know by now, many of us walk around with two phones, or others with one phone but several mobile accounts in the form of SIM cards. How many of the 6.7 Billion is the 'unique user' number? 4.3 Billion unique mobile phone owners/users on the planet. 60.1% of the true alive human population does have at least one mobile phone and at least one mobile account to themselves. Never has any technology been this widely spread. We are hitting the limits of electricity (600 million live beyond the reach of the electrical grid) and literacy (800 million adults are illiterate on the planet) yet even they do have mobile phone accounts. Some phones sold in the Emerging World are sold with extra-capacity batteries, other phones are sold with two or three batteries to help with the electricity problem. Vodafone introduced in Africa a charge that works on solar energy and for rainy days, through peddaling on your bicycle. And literacy? Yes, the illiterate won't be buying your smartphone apps anytime soon, but many voice-oriented services are highly appreciated delivering news, sports scores, music etc (and advertising) through the voice channel on the mobile.

ACTUAL PHONES - 5.2 BILLION IN USE

So then what of the phones? The planet has now 5.2 Billion mobile phone handsets in use, so for the 4.3 Billion unique users, so 26% of us - 1.1 Billion people already - walk around with two phones in their pockets. As I've been reporting on this phenomenon over the years, it is no longer a surprise in most markets. But yes, 5.2 Billion digital devices in human hands worldwide, every one of which can do voice calls and SMS text messaging. Most which have a color screen and often camera too. Most which can do rudimentary internet services (on WAP) and the vast majority which can do full HTML 'real internet' as well. While only 22% of all phones in use globally are 'smartphones' actually more than half of all phones in use can accept apps through such technologies as Java.

83% of all phones in use are cameraphones, so 4.4 Billion cameras are used in the world that are also connected to the network and are always carried, rather than the more premium stand-alone cameras that often sit in their cases back home. More than 90% of all humans who have ever taken a picture, have only done so on a cameraphone, not a stand-alone digital or film-based 'traditional' camera.

How massive is this? Mobile phones connected and in use totally dwarf any other tech, outnumbering television sets by more than 2 to 1, personal computers of all types, including tablet PCs like the iPad, by more than 4 to 1, DVD players by 5 to 1. Newspaper circulations by 12 to 1. Even after we account for us Westerners owning many FM radio sets, in our clock-radios, our boom boxes, our home HiFi sets and our cars, when counting for the whole planet, the number of mobile phones exceeds FM radios even, today. The second most sold consumer tech is the personal computer (including desktops, laptops and tablet PCs like the iPad) which has annual sales of about 350 million per year. The third most sold tech is televisions which only sell 250 million per year. Everything else is peanuts below that, from gaming consoles to cameras. But mobile phones? Sold over 1.7 Billion units last year! And by Christmas Quarter, nearly half of all new phones sold worldwide were smartphones. This year, 2013, we will see the cross-over point, where half of all new phones sold will be smartphones. No wonder the world's largest consumer electronics giant, Sony says that mobile is front and center of their future. Here is your table:

MOBILE SUBCRIBERS 2012
Total active mobile subscriptions or accounts . . . . 6.7B (was 5.9B in 2011, growth 14%)
Unique mobile users . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4.3 B (was 4.0B in 2011, growth 8%)
Actual mobile phones in use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5.2 B (was 4.8B in 2011, growth 8%)
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

INDUSTRY WORTH $1.45 TRILLION

So who is the richest man on the planet? No longer Bill Gates of Microsoft, it is Carlos Slim the CEO of America Movil the Mexico-based telecoms giant. Apple Computer changed its name to just Apple when it launched the iPhone and today calls itself a mobile company. Samsung the world's biggest tech company makes half of its profits through the mobile unit. Companies from Warner Music to Electronic Arts to the Associated Press newspaper guild are turning to mobile to make more money. The BBC said that all broadcast content, TV and radio, will be available on mobile. Visa says the future of payments, yes, the future of money itself, is mobile. What is this industry like?

Well, as the global economy struggled to get some anemic growth in 2012, the mobile industry grew its revenues by a massive 12% and hit 1.45 Trillion US dollars in total for the year. The mobile industry set the record for the fastest industry ever to reach that massive Trillion-dollar level (far bigger than for example the PC or TV or internet or advertising industries, just so you have some context). This global economic juggernaut is fuelled primarily by our voice calls and mobile messages (SMS and MMS) but there is an increasing part of revenues coming from 'premium data' services and also a healthy slice from hardware, in particular the handset sales. 3 out of every 4 dollars earned in the industry was service revenues, the remaining 1 out of 4 is hardware revenues ie handsets, their accessories, and the networking infrastructure needed to run these massive mobile telecoms networks. The major breakdown of the industry revenue is:

MOBILE INDUSTRY REVENUES 2012
Service Revenues . . . . . . . . .$1,101 B
 - Voice calls . . . . . . . . . . . . $  664 B
 - Non-messaging data . . . . . $  243 B
 - Messaging . . . . . . . . . . . . $  193 B
Hardware Revenues . . . . . . . $   350 B
 - Handset sales . . . . . . . . .  $  240 B
 - Accessories . . . . . . . . . . . $    65 B
 - Networking equipment . . . . $    45 B
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared


AVERAGE USER

So what do we do with our phones? I did the analysis of that statistic earlier, that we look at our phones 150 times per day. That gives a pretty good idea of where our time goes with the phone - messaging obviously, and voice calls, but also our clock and alarm, the calendar, our camera, the web browser, some games and music, news alerts etc. How do we use our phones? This is how I broke it down:

How Typical User Looks at Mobile 150 Times Per Day Globally
Messaging related 23 times per day
Voice call related 22 times per day
Clock 18 times per day
Music Player 13 times per day
Gaming 12 times per day
Social Media 9 times per day
Alarm 8 times per day
Camera 8 times per day
News and alerts 6 times per day
Calendar 5 times per day
Search 3 times per day
Other random web browsing 3 times per day
Charging phone 3 times per day
Voice mail 1 times per day
Other miscellaneous uses 10 times per day
Total 150 times per day
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

MOBILE HANDSET FEATURES

Then we of course look at the handset side of mobile in the Almanac. I devote a whole chapter to the handset numbers including the highly popular chart updating the global mobile installed base of the 5.2 Billion handsets in use, by their features. How many have a color screen, or have a camera, or have WiFi, etc. Here are the top-line numbers:

POPULAR MOBILE PHONE FEATURES OF INSTALLED BASE 2012
SMS texting ability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 100%
Any kind of browser (including WAP) . . . . 98%
MMS multimedia messaging capable . . . . 88%
Cameraphone (ie has inbuilt camera) . . . . 83%
Bluetooth  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 79%
3G capable or faster cellular connectivity . 45% *
WiFi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26%
Smartphone . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . . . . . 22%
 * note, many 3G phones in use are not connected to a 3G network, and even often if they are, are not on 3G dataplan pricing plans, so 3G user numbers are far below this installed base
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

Much much more in the TomiAhonen Almanac 2013 including the penetration rates of touch screens, of QWERTY keyboards, the camera resolutions of cameraphones, etc etc etc, plus of course also the 'horse race' statistics of who sold the most phones last year by brand.

SMARTPHONE INSTALLED BASED BY PLATFORM

What of the mobile 'ecosystems' out there? You often hear of single quarter sales that may fluctuate a lot. Individual handset makers may shift their allegiances from one smartphone OS platform to another. What is the state of the industry now, by installed base of smartphone platforms. That is the 'bottom line' question, isn't it? I keep reporting the status of the installed base here on this blog as I do my quarterly review of the smartphone races. This is what the world looked like at the end of 2012:

Installed Base of Smartphones by Operating System 2012 (vs 2011)
1 (2) - Google Android . . . . . . . . . . 48% (31%)
2 (3) - Apple iPhone  . . . . . . . . . . . 19% (16%)
3 (1) - Nokia Symbian . . . . . . . . . . 15% (33%)
4 (4) - RIM Blackberry . . . . . . . . . . . 8% (12%)
5 (5) - Samsung bada  . . . . . . . . . .  2% ( 3%)
6 (7) - MS Windows Phone  . . . . . .  2% ( 1%)
7 (6) - MS Windows Mobile . . . . . . . 1% ( 2%)
Others . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1% (3%)
TOTAL SMARTPHONES IN USE . . . 1,320 Million
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

But there is so much more in the Almanac. I have whole chapters on mobile advertising and marketing, mobile music, mobile social networking, mobile TV and video, mobile gaming, mobile messaging - yes, of course this year's edition includes OTT messaging cannibalization measured - etc, etc, etc. I give you counts of apps and voice calls and enterprise/business accounts and 3G migration rates. The Almanac includes a whole chapter on the Digital Divide, so it shows how the advanced 'West' or Industrialized World mobile numbers differ from the 'Emerging World' where most people live, in Africa, Latin America and the less-developed parts of Asia like India, China, Indonesia, Pakistan etc. I also give more details on the business-side of this newest and fastest-growing Trillion-dollar industry ever, like my exclusive TomiAhonen Consulting index of mobile leadership that many seem to like and use.

WHAT COUNTRIES ARE THE GLOBAL LEADERS IN MOBILE INDUSTRY AND INNOVATION

Here is the newest top 12 ranking of the world's most advanced countries by their mobile industry, handset, consumer and services maturity:

WORLD'S MOST ADVANCED COUNTRIES RANKED BY THE MATURITY OF THEIR MOBILE INDUSTRY
1 (1) - Japan
2 (3) - Singapore
3 (2) - South Korea
4 (5) - Finland
5 (6 tie) - Taiwan
6 (6 tie) - Sweden
7 (4) - Italy
8 (9) - Hong Kong
9 (8) - Austria
10 tie (13 tie) - Denmark
10 tie (12) - UK
12 (10) - Australia
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

And yes, the USA is gaining on that chart, and has moved up from its rank last year of 17th to its current ranking of tied for 15th with the Netherlands, just ahead of UAE, and just behind Israel and Norway. But when the USA is barely past its 100% per-capita mobiel subscriber count - and Hong Kong for example has passed 200%, or the USA is near 50% smartphone ownership where Singapore is past 80%, and where the USA still sells handsets and subscriptions to second generation 2G network based technology while Japan has shut down the 2G networks and is all 3G or faster, obviously there are other countries that are well ahead of the USA in their mobile industry. Harsh truths, but we deal with the truth on this blog. And yes, for those who do not know my index, I use the four most used and most representative statistics on the maturity of the industry, to generate my index: the mobile phone subscription penetration rate per capita; the migration rate to more advanced networks, the mobile service adoption rate, and the migration of the handsets to more advanced phones (ie currently measuring the migration from dumbphones to smartphones). And most international mobile industry experts will agree that Japan, Singapore and South Korea are world leaders in mobile, and that Finland, Sweden and Italy are the European leaders, where the Industrialized part of Asia and advanced parts of Europe are well ahead of North America, Latin America and Africa in their mobile adoption and yes, Australia is well ahead of North America as well. By the way, the Almanac has much more on the index and the top 30 countries if you need more.

But there are much much more data points in the Almanac, including a stats table section where we have the 60 biggest mobile countries and details on them like their subscriber counts, penetration rates per capita, and exclusively, also their unique mobile owner counts, plus such data as what countries have launched 3G and what have launched MVNO services etc. There are tables of what countries lead by subscriber counts, by penetration rates, by 3G migration rates etc. And there is the list of the biggest mobile operator groups.

WHO ARE THE GIANT COMPANIES OF THIS TRILLION-DOLLAR INDUSTRY?

And as always, the TomiAhonen Almanac includes my exclusive listing of the world's largest companies, when measured only by their mobile revenues. So for example for Apple we remove the Mac, iPad and iPod related incomes, for Vodafone we remove their fixed landline business and for Samsung we remove their plasma TV business and chips business, etc. What are the world's largest companies in 2012 when we only measure their mobile business? This is what the top 10 looks like for 2012:

BIGGEST COMPANIES WHEN ONLY COUNTING THEIR MOBILE BUSINESS
(This chart data is harmonized for the annual release of the Fortune Global 500 issue)
(Data is current as of the second calendar quarter of 2012 ie through about end of June 2012)
1 (1) China Mobile, China, operator . . . . . . . $ 87 B
2 (2) Verizon Wireless, USA, operator  . . . . $ 75 B
3 (9) Apple iPhone, USA, smartphones . . . . $ 74 B
4 (10) Samsung Galaxy, S Korea, handsets . $ 69 B
5 (4) AT&T Wireless, USA, operator . . . . . .  $ 62 B
6 (3) Vodafone Mobile, UK, operator . . . . . .  $ 60 B
7 (5) Telefonica Movil, Spain, operator . . . . . $ 55 B
8 (11) NTT DoCoMo, Japan, operator . . . . . . $ 48 B
9 (6) T-Mobile, Germany, operator . . . . . . . . $ 47 B
10 (7) Orange Mobile, France, operator . . . .  $ 46 B
Note: All except China Mobile in the above chart are 'virtual companies' with imaginary names to reflect their mobile businesses and their mobile branding.
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

The above data shows how strongly Apple and Samsung have already jumped up the charts powered by their smartphone businesses (and by contrast, the once giant 'Nokia Mobile' has tumbled down to 12th and is falling further). The European operators/carriers saw their industry hit by the new EU regulations that cut their international interconnect revenues, so all Europe-based carriers/operators saw a bad fiscal year and their rankings tumbled for the year. That should stabilize now for the next year. And as to Samsung and Apple, remember, their phenomenal growth is continuing. This data was through only the second calendar quarter of 2012, to harmonize this chart with the annual Fortune Global 500 issue. So the two smartphone maker giants are sure to move up even more for next year.

So there is your summary data for the industry for big industry numbers. This year, two huge milestones coming - the Mobile Moment will hit us this summer, when the count of active mobile subscriptions will match the count of human population alive on the planet, and also probably in the summer, we will reach the point where half of all new phones sold will be smartphones.

As always, you may share and use any data in this blog, create your own diagrams and pictures, use this data in infographics etc. Please refer to this blog if you can, or just list that the source is the TomiAhonen Almanac 2013.

And for those who want to see it, or order it, remember the Almanac only costs 9.99 Euros and you can have all these stats - and literally 91 more charts and tablets not mentioned in this blog (the latest Almanac has 98 tables and charts in total) - on an ebook you can install onto your smartphone, iPad or laptop and carry all the mobile data at your fingertips. For those who already own the 2012 edition, all the data is updated obviously, and new charts in the 2013 version that weren't in the 2012 edition are: 150 Times Per day (in mobile Customers chapter), a chart showing MMS migration rate from SMS and another showing OTT cannibalization are new, while the OTT user count is added to mobile messaging user chart (in Messaging chapter),  the Social Networking chapter adds a table of the biggest social networks when measured by their mobile users. The 2013 edition of the Almanac runs 194 pages. To see more here TomiAhonen Almanac 2013. 

World's Biggest Computer Makers when PCs, Tablets AND Smartphones Are Included (Updated & Corrected)

Its time to update the biggest computer-maker listing. I really wish the big analyst houses would take over this chore, they report on the data separately already.. but yes, I was the first to start to count smartphones into the total computer shipment numbers and have reported that statistic now for many years already. If you want to see the chart for end of 2011, its here.. Time to do the 2012 number update:


So I have taken total computer shipments in units (mainframes, desktop PCs, laptop PCs, notebook and netbook PCs; plus tablet PCs like the iPad, Kindle and and Galaxy Tab; and smartphones - but not basic 'featurephones'). I used the best available data such as summaries by Gartner and IDC, plus individual company data for the non-smartphone computer data, and my own company analysis for the smartphone data for year 2012. Here is the Top 10 biggest computer makers chart, when all forms of personal computers are included:

 

LARGEST COMPUTER MAKERS WHEN SMARTPHONES & TABLETS INCLUDED
Rank (was) . . Brand . . . . . . Units 2012 . . Market Share 2012
1 (1) . . . . . . . Apple . . . . . . 272 M . . . . . 22%
2 (2) . . . . . . . Samsung . . . 249 M . . . . . 20%
3 (6) . . . . . . . Lenovo . . . . . . 77 M . . . . . . 6%
4 (4) . . . . . . . HP  . . . . . . . . 59 M . . . . . . 5%
5 (7) . . . . . . . Dell . . . . . . . . 38 M . . . . . . 3%
6 (10) . . . . . . Sony . . . . . . . 37 M . . . . . . 3%
7 (9) . . . . . . . Acer  . . . . . . . 36 M . . . . . . 3%
8 (3) . . . . . . . Nokia . . . . . . . 35 M . . . . . . 3%
9 (5).  . . . . . . RIM . . . . . . . . 35 M . . . . . . 3%
10 (-)  . . . . . . Huawei . . . . . . 32 M . . . . . . 3%
 . . . . . . . . . .  Others . . . . . 354 M  . . . . . 27%
TOTAL  . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,224 M

Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013 from company and industry data, February 2013
This data and this table may be freely shared

If you want to see how that splits by type of computer, it goes like this:
Smartphones . . . . . . 695 M . . 57%
Traditional PCs  . . . . 353 M . . 29%
Tablet PCs  . . . . . . . 176 M . . 14%
Total Computers . . 1,224 M
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013 from company and industry data, February 2013
This data and this table may be freely shared

Note the near perfect symmetry in the data for 2012. Tablet pcs sold almost half a million per day. Traditional PCs sold almost exactly twice that number, almost 1 million per day. And smartphones sold nearly twice as many as traditional PCs, and almost 2 million per day...

Looking at the Top 10 chart, Apple holds onto the top slot for the third year in a row but now starts to feel the heat of Samsung closing. Nokia tumbled from the past number 1 slot all the way down to 8th ranking and may tumble out of the list by the end of this year. Lenovo moved up fast powered by its smartphones and HP holds stubbornlhy onto the 4th ranking based only by its traditional PC sales (but there are rumors HP may come back to smartphones once again.) Chinese maker Huawei enters the chart powered only by its smartphone sales. Sony is moving up the chart as well from 10th to 7th while RIM is falling fast to 9th (was ranked 5th last time). HTC fell out of the Top 10. Then lets look at the operating system war


LARGEST OPERATING SYSTEMS OF COMPUTERS WHEN SMARTPHONES & TABLETS INCLUDED
Rank . . . . . Brand . . . . . . Units 2012  . . Market Share 2012 . . Market Share 2011
1 (2) . . . . . Android . . . . . 462 M . . . . . . 38% . . . . . . . . . . . . 23%
1 (1) . . . . . Windows . . . . 296 M . . . . . . 24% . . . . . . . . . . . . 31%
3 (3) . . . . . iOS . . . . . . . . 272 M . . . . . . 22% . . . . . . . . . . . . 21%
4 (5) . . . . . Blackberry . . . . 34 M . . . . . . . 3%  . . . . . . . . . . . . 6%
5 (4) . . . . . Symbian  . . . . . 19 M . . . . . . . 2%  . . . . . . . . . . . . 9%
. . . . . . . . . Others . . . . . . 141 M . . . . . . 12%
TOTAL  . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1,224 M 

The overwhelming market dominance of Microsoft in the computer industry has now ended. Andoid (and Google) have become the biggest provider of computer operating systems, ending Microsoft's reign on top that lasted 30 years. 2012 was the first year when more computing devices running Android were sold, and now Apple's iOS ecosystem is chasing Windows and is likely to pass it in 2013. Obviously the powerhouse that was Symbian on pocketable devices has all but vanished.

All data here may be freely shared 

NOTE: This table was updated to reflect Huawei official 2012 numbers and resulting changes to the bottom of the Top 10 chart. In an earlier edition of this chart, Huawei was ranked 5th based on its preliminary 2012 smartphone shipments widely reported.


For anyone who wants all the data on the mobile telecoms industry in one handy reference source, see the TomiAhonen Almanac 2013.  

Early Thoughts on New Operating Systems - Ubuntu, Sailfish (Jolla/MeeGo), Tizen (Samsung's update to MeeGo), Firefox; and some updates to classics BB10, WP8

This year 2013 will see several new smartphone operating systems launched. This blog is my first overview to these new arrivals, and is in response to perhaps the most requested commentary by me, from my Twitter followers in the past few months. What do I think of Ubuntu or Firefox or Sailfish or Tizen.. (or Blackberry 10 or Windows Phone 8)

Some might think this is 'too late' and that the market is 'already settled' into the duopoly that is Google's Android, and Apple's iOS (which according to Strategy Analytics held 92% of the smartphone market in Q4. My calculations have the pair with a little bit less, but still, they are the two giants currently). That may seem reasonable, until you understand the scale of the market and the near future. Smartphones sold a little over 700 million units in 2012, up 45% from just one year before. Smartphones now sell about twice the level that personal computers of all type sell per year (that includes the tablet PCs like the iPad), and almost three times as many as television sets globally. This must be 'too late' for a new operating system to enter and become big, isn't it.

No its not. The total global handset industry sells about 1.8 billion handsets per year (ie most of those were still 'dumbphones' in 2012, and only about 39% of those were smartphones. The handset industry experts have joined me in my originally quite radical view  that all handsets would become 'smartphones' - and my view is that this transition will be completed (in new handset sales, not in installed base) before this decade is done. The annual sales of handsets will likely stabilize near the 2 Billion per year level, so we have something near 1.3 Billion annual sales growth left to do for smartphones - almost two times as much unclaimed, as the total market size in 2012.

This IS the right time to get in, if you ever wanted to be a major player in smartphones, whether on the hardware or the software and operating system size. During 2013 will we be somewhere near 1 Billion smartphone sales and about half the potential is taken. After that, it will become increasingly hard to break into the market, and probably by 2015 it will be too late.

Thats not to say, that Android isn't in the driving seat. Android was powering 70% of all smartphones sold in Q3 of 2012 and Android is used by seven of the ten largest smartphone makers, while the three others in the top 10 use three separate and incompatible systems. Android is the obvious big target and Google has played the smartphone opportunity remarkably well, so far. Apple had a strong growth trajectory in gobbling up huge chunks of market share until that growth bonanza stalled two years ago, and Apple's gains have been anemic, one or two market share points per year since. It is high time for Apple to either launch a lower-cost iPhone (what I call the iPhone Nano) or else abandon any hope of being a major player in the races, and becoming a niche maker similar to what RIM/Blackberry has become. The race for the smartphone market is mostly one of low-cost mass-market mainstream basic smartphones, not the high end of the iPhone 5 and Samsung Galaxy S4.

HOW YOU WIN IN SMARTPHONES

There will be lots of techie 'experts' who bring their 'insights' into explaining why one OS is better than another, why its UI is more appealing or its app selection is the winner, etc. They are clueless. We saw how badly these experts misunderstand the handset market, from all the forecasts made in 2010 about what will happen to Nokia smartphone sales in 2012 as the new Lumia Windows Phone strategy is implemented (experts had errors of the scale of 200% and more, the worst 'expert' organization had a forecasting error of 332% !!!). That is not an isolated example, I will shortly be reporting on how badly the tech pundits and experts misjudged the launch of Windows Phone and the Microsoft market share for 2012 (can you believe, errors up to 400% !!! ???)

Smartphones may look like tiny pocket-sized computers, so many PC industry experts are quick to offer their 'insights'. They do not know, that this industry operates on totally different market rules than the PC market. Handsets are technically approved, and supported by the carriers/operators, who act as gate-keepers to all markets. If you do not have carrier support, you cannot win in a market. Witness Apple's iPhone for example, or Microsoft's Kin (forgot about that one, did you, the phone that died in six weeks from launch, because no carriers would support it). 

In smartphones the best handset or best operating system or best app store does not win. They all are important, yes, but they are not the key to winning. Else in 2010, Apple's iPhone would have crushed Nokia's Symbian, because by every measure, in 2010, the iPhone was the better smartphone than then-current Nokia flagship, the N97; the iOS was far better than Nokia's first iteration of its aging Symbian OS attempting to do touch-screen; and the Apple iPhone App Store had more apps than Nokia's Ovi store. Why then did Nokia outsell Apple by 2 to 1, and more importantly, Apple grew 22.4 million smartphone unit sales from 2009 to 2010, but Nokia grew 35.8 million. How is it possible that a clearly inferior product line, on an inferior OS and UI, and a smaller app environment, can grow more than the better one? Its not about whose phone or OS is better in smartphones. Its about the carrier relationships (and related retail distribution). Nokia had by far the best carrier relations and retail distribution in the mobile handset industry at the time, Apple did not. So Nokia was able to sell an inferior product but get bigger growth - because of carrier relations and distribution.

Again, this is no anomaly. Look at Palm and the WebOS, the best smartphone and OS this side of an iPhone. It died. Being best does not give you the world. Or Samsung's bada - my apologies to all my Samsung friends, but bada was hardly the most exciting most advanced most capable OS. Yet it sold 20 million units in 2012. Why? Because Samsung currently has the best carrier relationships and widest distribution channel reach of any handset maker in the world.

Please do not misunderstand me. I am not saying the handset design doesn't matter, that the user interface doesn't matter or the app store doesn't matter etc. I AM saying, that they will not decide your success. The decisive factor is carrier support, the second most important factor is resale distribution deals. Of course a good OS is better than having a bad one, that the iOS is so user-friendly that a 3 year old understands how to use an iPhone, and so does a 93 year old, without reading any user manuals - that is why Apple's iPhone has such fiercely loyal customer retention rates. But that is mostly loyalty and retention (Nokia used to have that too, with its messaging, its cameras, its QWERTY keyboards, its FM radios etc..). The key to gaining market share - especially for a new brand - is carrier support and retail distribution. Carrier backlash is one of the biggest reasons that has caused Blackberry to decline sales in past two years. Carrier support is why Huawei has been so successful in gaining big chunks of market share globally (partly helped by the fact that Huawei can bundle handsets in a network equipment deal, like Nokia and Ericsson often did in the 1990s).

UBUNTU NOT CONTENDING

So first up, Ubuntu. The Linux based open source OS with strong African roots is celebrated by many tech fans and PC experts as an obvious choice for smartphone makers, especially those sick and tired of the Microsoft Windows dominance on the PC side, and suggesting that PC makers should feel a natural affinity to the OS. Yeah, well, you don't win by having an OS that is popular on the far smaller desktop world, else Windows would have 90% of the smartphones market. Rather, after literally a decade of trying, Microsoft's smartphone platform has managed a peak of 12% global market share and today lingers at .. 2% in annual sales. There is no 'synergy' between the desktop and the pocket. HP was the latest victim to discover this when it tried to create some synergy for Palm that it bought, using WebOS, and the world's bestselling PC brand, HP. Lenovo learned this lesson, it released its smartphones using Android instead, and in one year climbed into the Top 10 biggest smartphone makers, and now, in Q4 is ranked either 5th or 6th (racing with Sony, we have not seen Sony's numbers yet).

Ubuntu will need two big hurdles. First, it needs support by major handset makers, it should attract at least one of the Top 10 manufacturers, preferrably more than one, to have any chance. They, the handset makers, have to commit to a couple of handsets that run Ubuntu OS, and then - the most difficult hurdle, Ubuntu needs to secure carrier support where several significant carriers agree to support the new handsets using Ubuntu. This is not an impossible task but it is a huge task. The schedule for Ubuntu calls for first phones to be available about a year from now. So far, we have not seen the news that needs to happen. This is why I am not currently taking Ubuntu smartphone aspirations very seriously (yet). They have to get these deals into place, to even be 'entered into the race'. They are like someone in the Olympics, who is not even allowed to line up to the starting gate yet. Ubuntu has not qualified for this contest. They might do it, they have to hurry, but so far, they haven't.

FIREFOX VERY DARK HORSE

Then we have Firefox. The web browser company Mozilla has been working on its smartphone OS, as an open source HTML based platform, and has been making the early needed steps. ZTE, a Top 10 sized smartphone maker has announced it will introduce a Firefox based smartphone now in February at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona. There is a tiny start-up smartphone maker Geeksphone of Spain who has announced two Firefox based smartphones. So there is a little bit of handset manufacturer support but the handset offering is still slim. Meanwhile, bigger hurdle, the carrier support? Thats not yet there. There is some gossip that 'a European carrier' might be interested and KDDI of Japan has said it is looking into possibly doing some Firefox in its smartphone offering, but no carrier deals yet. But Firefox has achieved 'support' by a good list of carriers such as Telefonica, TIM, T-Mobile, Sprint, Etisalat, Smart and Telenor. That is not the same as a carrier actually launching the phone and is a far cry from selling it in its stores or offering any handset subsidies to the smartphones. But Firefox does have handsets coming now, and many carriers are in discussions. Firefox could be a dark horse to have a tiny slice of this pie going into 2014. What is very much needed now, is more than one handset model by one Top 10 manufacturer.

SAILFISH (ie MeeGo 2.0 version A) PRETENDER

Jolla the Finnish start-up made of ex-Nokia staff from the killed MeeGo/Maemo project, is in a similar stage as Firefox, but on a very different trajectory. Jolla is stepping into the shoes vacated by Nokia in abandoning the hugely admired N9 and N950 smartphones running MeeGo. The N9 is the most heralded Nokia smartphone of all time and the only one that regularly beat the iPhone in side-by-side tests by major handset magazines and comparison websites. The N9 was headed to huge global success, until bizarrely the Nokia CEO decided it will not be sold in any major markets and will not be allowed to compete against the iPhone for example not being sold in the USA, UK, Germany etc. The N9 running MeeGo won the world's most prestigious technology design awards the D&AD Award in 2012, beating Apple's brand new iPad 2 among its rivals for the award. The German weekly newsmagazine Der Stern loved the N9 so much, it encouraged its readers to fly to other countries like Switzerland and Austria to buy an N9, it was that good in the magazine's opinion (yet Nokia refused to sell it in Germany??). And as Nokia refused to sell the sister phone, the N950 anywhere, only producing a very tiny run of the device, its second hand resale prices are above a thousand Euros. Nokia had a huge flagship hit product on its hands, when it had the N9 and N950 running MeeGo, yet Nokia abandoned this massive tech lead.

So enter Jolla. Jolla was formed with the help of Nokia's employee departure program and some seed funding, and took the insights and design ideas that the MeeGo/Maemo team had with the N9, N950 and other MeeGo devices, and builds upon that. Their new Sailfish OS is an evolution past MeeGo, still as an open source Linux based OS, and one could think of Sailfish as a kind of MeeGo 2.0 (version A). Sailfish is compatible with the (formerly Nokia owned) Qt application development tools and some gossip suggests the similarity between Sailfish and Android is so close, many Android apps can run natively on Sailfish. If so, Sailfish would almost overnight jump over that hurdle of 'how many apps do you have' and inherit a part in the biggest app environment that Android is now becoming, passing the iPhone App Store.

The point with Jolla is, that it is not attempting (at least initially) to be a mass market brand and platform, but rather a premium OS at the high end of the market, competing with the iPhone and Samsung Galaxy, perhaps even aiming into the price stratosphere where Vertu exists. Considering how strong the passions were for the N9 and N950, and as the N9 was the only smartphone by ANY BRAND that regularly beat the iPhone in side-by-side tests, this is not a hopeless fantasy. The Jolla staff of about a 100 employees are essentially the same as the heart of Nokia's MeeGo team. So what we will later this year see from Jolla's first smartphone(s) are what probably could have been the 'follow-up' to the N9. The first Jolla phone may well be the ultimate superphone of year 2013 and get massive attention because of that.

Then, its their business model. To price the Jolla high enough to be able to skim those profits and slice a piece of the high-end that Apple's iPhone and Samsung's Galaxy own. Jolla doesn't need to sell 10 million in the first year to be successful and become viable in the mid term. And if the Sailfish OS starts to win all sorts of comparisons vs the iPhone, soon there may be more makers joining the Sailfish family. So for Jolla, the definition of success is quite different from most others on this list. They are not even attempting a mass market play, they know from the start, they hold a premium platform and they intend to fight for the top end of the market, not the bottom end.

Which brings me to the handset partners. We just heard that Chinese smartphone maker Zopo has decided to launch smartphones on Sailfish to sell in India. Are there carriers? The first one is signed up, Finland's DNA is committed to launching Jolla's first smartphone(s) in Finland. Yes, Finland only has 5.3 million people and DNA is the smallest of the three carriers in Finland but still, this is a real live carrier deal already signed up. And you can bet your bottom dollar that fiercely patriotic Finns will flock to Jolla to buy their first-ever smartphone, if it is anywhere near as good a follow-up to the N9 as we might expect. Meanwhile about the distribution deals? China's D.Phone, the largest handset store/distributor has signed up a deal to sell Jolla's smartphones in China. As China Mobile was a partner with MeeGo, there must be at least implied support from the world's largest mobile operator/carrier who counts one out of every 8 existing mobile phone users as its customer in the world - the carrier which alone is bigger than Sprint, plus AT&T, plus Verizon, plus T-Mobile USA, combined - and doubled.

Jolla's road is not secure, Sailfish has a big task ahead of itself, but for its early steps, it has already one handset partner, it has already signed its first carrier deal and has its first independent distribution deal. The Sailfish OS is already set to launch in China and India, the two largest mobile handset markets in the world. Jolla doesn't need to achieve huge success on this path, to make a splash globally and get the attention they want, to survive into 2014 and beyond. Will Sailfish reach 1% this year or even next, probably not, but they don't need to. They know they are a niche player at the luxury end. If they can do a million per quarter, thats enough for now, then grow from there. And then, if we find someone at the bottom end of the Top 10, wanting to differentiate from Android, with a high quality OS, we could suddenly find that someone like ZTE or Lenovo or LG suddenly announce their premium line will be powered by Sailfish.. But that would look more into 2014 than 2013..

TIZEN (ie MeeGo 2.0 Version B) THE CONTENDER

There are no sure things in mobile. But Tizen is the nearest thing to a sure thing, in smartphones. Why? First, because this is the big scale relaunch of MeeGo. MeeGo was a joint project by Nokia and Nokia's past Maemo project, merged with Intel's Moblin, both Linux based open source smarpthone OS projects. So when Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop suddenly announced on 11 February that Nokia was quitting the MeeGo path to its future and selecting Windows instead (Intel's CEO was apparently informed literally on the night before the announcement! Talk about arrogance), Intel rushed to rescue the project and find a new handset partner. And if you lose the world's largest handset maker, who would you prefer to have to replace it? The second largest handset maker of course. Intel found its new partner in Samsung. The project was renamed Tizen, it now includes both Linux and HTML in its code and is still an open source OS project, of course and merges also Samsung's own in-house bada project efforts.

Samsung's bada has been a stealth success story. Many in the West are quick to dismiss it, because they haven't seen any bada smartphones in the USA or the UK.. They think it has failed. Meanwhile bada has been a considerable 'third ecosystem' success from Russia to France to India to Brazil. bada has achieved nearly 30 million cumulative sales in its first 2 years. That is more than the iPhone did in its first two years! Yes, bada is the most successful new smartphone OS launch in history! But because most of the sales were in Emerging World countries - at low price points where bada was targeted - most Western analysts have ignored bada, and often do not even mention it as a major OS rival. But let me repeat, in the first two years, bada has sold more smartphones than Apple was able to sell iPhones in its first two years. Why is this? Partly its price, but mostly its - Samsung. Samsung has the world's best carrier relationships and retail distribution now that Nokia has shot itself in the foot and Samsung has easily stepped in, smoothly taking over whatever Nokia has abandoned. Samsung has literally today the best carrier relationships and the widest distribution reach in handsets. And obviously Samsung has become the world's biggest handset maker and biggest smarpthone maker.

For Tizen, consider bada as the 'practise run'. Samsung has previously used operating systems made by others - Nokia's Symbian, Microsoft's Windows, Google's Android etc. bada was their first attempt to launch a low-end, low cost OS. bada was intended to be Samsung's own OS and they didn't try very hard to win handset manufacturer partners to join in the 'ecosystem'. This is all different with Intel now and Tizen. Intel back from the days of Moblin, and with Nokia and MeeGo, had already secured handset maker partners and Tizen's Board includes Fujitsu, NEC, Panasonic and Huawei in addition to Intel and Samsung among handset manufacturers. More critically, what of carrier support? The Tizen Board includes NTT DoCoMo, Orange, Sprint, Vodafone, Korea Telecom and SK Telecom.

These are not 'supporters' of an OS who like it and will test it or consider it. These are Board Members on the OS, who are committed to developing Tizen. The handset manufacturers cover 40% of all smartphones sold in the world (mostly currently on Android). The carriers that are represented on Tizen's Board cover 11% of the total mobile subscriber base on the planet.

If you take the technical excellence that Nokia and Intel managed to produce with the first release of MeeGo and the first two handsets, N9 and N950 (while the new Nokia CEO was torpedoing every step of the launch) - and we add two years of further development, by Intel and Samsung - Tizen is likely to be a true generational leap beyond 'the operating system considered better than iOS'. When Samsung is winning all sorts of awards with the Galaxy series, and now gets to launch its flagship OS, Tizen, you can expect the first Tizen based Samsung smartphones to be glorious. When we see that in its 'practise run' of bada, Samsung was able to sell more bada smartphones in the first two years, than Apple in its high-profile media extravaganza that was the iPhone from 2007, and now Samsung gets to take all that and do better with Tizen, expect some fireworks. And that is, before we add in Huawei, the world's third-largest smartphone maker. And we add Fujitsu and Panasonic, both past Top 10 smartphone makers from Japan who are eager to return to the world stage and make similar profits with smartphones as tech giants rivals like Samsung, LG, Apple, Lenovo etc have done recently. Samsung and Huawei have promised first Tizen phones out this year. Samsung specifically has promised multiple Tizen phones and there is a tech spec of a Galaxy version running Tizen.

The operators/carriers have frequently been saying they would welcome a third ecosystem alongside Android and the iPhone. Windows Phone cannot become that because carriers hate and fear Skype (don't argue this point, Nokia's CEO Stephen Elop himself said so to Nokia's shareholder meeting, that carriers don't like Microsoft because of Skype, adding 'of course'). Carriers also don't like Blackberry for the cannibalization of messaging by the BBM system and how RIM/Blackberry has been 'too secure' and bypassing carrier systems. Samsung and Intel understand carrier concerns - why else have six carriers joining six equipment makers on the Tizen Board? Of any new OS, Tizen is BY FAR the most carrier-friendly, and least threatening OS. Expect the carriers to warmly embrace Tizen this year and for Samsung to offer a lot of choice in its smartphones, many 'sister' devices, where they run Android or Tizen, and often carriers starting to push the Tizen variants. Again, Samsung knows now how to play this game, just this past week we heard of the Telegraph survey of UK retail, finding that when their undercover shoppers visited UK handset retailers, the most offered phones were Samsung Galaxies, even ahead of iPhones.

Like I said, there are no guarantees. If the first Tizen phones are dogs, or have severe bugs, or Samsung has some PR fiasco with carriers etc, the picture might change fast. But by current view, Tizen is set to exceed the performance of bada, and very importantly, differing from bada, Tizen to launch in all markets including the two most advanced smartphone markets, Japan and South Korea with major carrier support in both.

Tizen could hit 2% market share per quarter by the end of this year and easily rise to something like 5% market share by end of 2014. If so, Tizen would rather easily become the Third Ecosystem and then gradually grow to something near 10% in the next few years. Note, that most of Tizen's gains would come directly from Android. Still, if you remove 10% from Android's 70% now, it still leaves Google as the Gorilla of mobile, with 60% and at least 3 times bigger than number 2 (iPhone) and 6 times bigger than number 3 (Tizen). Hardly a 'threat' to Google and Android dominance.. But Tizen is likely to put an end to any hopes Blackberry or Windows have of ever becoming the third ecosystem haha..

BLACKBERRY 10 RELEGATED

BB10 is obviously not a new platform as such, its a new release of the oldest surviving platform play in smartphones. The first Blackberry smartphone came out in 2001 and all its contemporaries have died or been killed like Palm and Symbian. Windows didn't enter the smartphone wars until later in the decade. So now we've just seen BB10. The phones look new and modern, the OS looks good. But there is nothing radical, no great leap ahead. Blackberry has played catch-up and only become yet another 'me too' i-Phon-a-clone. This new fresh OS was desperately needed to stem the decline. But it, and the first 2 phones shown, is not enough to vault Blackberry back into contention for major position in smartphones. Just four years ago Blackberries had over 20% market share globally. Now the Beebee lingers at 3%. In fact, Blackberry's collapse ranks as the 7th fastest handset collapse in history. This new BB10 is no silver bullet to restore Blackberry to 20% market share or even half that. Blackberry's decline hopefully has ended. If they have good headwinds in Waterloo this year, BB might end the year near 5% market share, more likely they will be near the 3% they are today. Blackberry had its chance, it blew it by taking the eyes off the ball, and focusing its limited marketing efforts to launch the ill-fated tablet.. That chance is forever gone and Blackberry is now relegated to forever being a niche player, serving the enterprise segment of smartphones. A profitable business, no doubt, but one that is not growing as fast as the overall smartphone business.

WINDOWS PHONE 8

And what of our 'darling', WP8, which was promised by so many 'experts' to now hold something like 20% market share and was supposed to be the 'third ecosystem' and to challenge or by some 'experts' even pass the iPhone in sales, especially after Nokia joined in the 'partnership'. Yeah. That all went tits up. Windows had 12% market share in smartphones in 2007. It was down to 5% in 2010. Windows market share was down to 2% in 2011 and now that Nokia has launched 9 Lumia smartphones, supported by the world's largest smartphone launch marketing budget, joined by massive marketing suppport by Microsoft, and added to by the biggest handset launch budgets ever by some of the carriers like AT&T in the USA - what is Windows market share in smartphones now? In 2012 it was.. 2%. Windows Phone is failing comprehensively.

Nokia's CEO took Nokia's 35% market share with Symbian in 2010, and forcibly migrated it to Windows Phone. How many took this gambit? 2%. 1% is still left on Symbian as of Q4 of 2012, so 32% of Nokia's loyal customers have rather run away, taking an Android based smartphone like Samsung's Galaxy, or Apple's iPhone instead of taking the Lumia. And what of those who actually took the Lumia? The independent Yankee Group survey of customer satisfaction of USA based Lumia owners found that 4 out of 10 hated the phone so much, they rated it worst phone they've ever seen. And the brand new Bernstein loyalty survey of smartphone owners in USA and UK, found that the Windows Phone loyalty is so bad, two out of three will never buy another Windows Phone based smartphone again. The Windows Phone experiment has failed and is a dead man walking, only surviving as long as Nokia exists as a smartphone maker with Elop as its CEO (we have an Elop Firing Watch on this blog, counting down to when he is fired or Nokia itself is sold).

Almost all past Windows partners have already given up on Windows including Sony, Motorola, LG, Dell, Palm, etc - and of the last who remain, they cut their Windows offering like HTC and Samsung or postpone their first launches and cut their intended WP8 product lines like Huawei and ZTE. Most of the remaining Windows Phone 'partners' have other preferred new OS projects they now prioritize, from Tizen to Firefox. And if Nokia's CEO Elop is fired, his successor will no doubt almost instantly announce the end of Windows Phone and a shift to Android.

There are those who say 'but synergy' with Windows 8 on the desktop. Yeah. Where have we heard that before? Like with Windows Mobile. Like with Windows Phone 6. Like with Windows Phone 7. Like with Symbian - Stephen Elop when he was still at Microsoft, negotiated that 'partnership' where all Microsoft Office suite apps were made compatible with Symbian and Nokia E-Series. What good did that 'synergy' get the two tech giants? None whatsover. There probably IS some synergy from the desktop to the laptop to netbooks to tablet PCs. Yes, maybe Microsoft's Surface tablet can benefit from Windows 8 'synergy' but on smartphones we have one decade of evidence that it doesn't matter one iota. Windows has been the slowly dying operating system of smartphones, only kept alive by continued cash injections by Microsoft. All Microsoft partners who ever focused on Windows Phone have become unprofitable doing so, and only recovered to profits by abandoning the Windows path, from Sendo (bankrupted) to Motorola (bankrupted) to LG (recovered) to HTC (recovered). Windows 'life span' in smartphones continues only as long as Nokia CEO continues on his borrowed time. And as to Microsoft building its own smartphones - yeah, they tried that once before, remember Kin the world-record in market failure of a new handset launch, died in six weeks? What killed Kin was utter lack of carrier support. The carriers hate Microsoft, they fear Microsoft, they hate Skype, they don't trust Ballmer, they'd be idiots to go to bed with the company that always drives its 'partners' to bankruptcy, just like its now doing to Nokia.

So thats my view today of the upcoming newcomers to the smartphone OS races. My best wishes to all, we welcome competition and variety. But in the long run, the industry cannot sustain dozens of platforms, some will naturally disappear, like we've seen in the past with Palm, Symbian, LiMo, MeeGo etc. If I had to pick the strongest horse from this stable, I definitely have to pick Tizen. And as a Finn and ex Nokian, I do hope sincerely that Jolla and Sailfish do make a nice success out of their venture. 

PS - for those who need to have more data about the global handset industry including market shares, regional markets, average prices, installed bases, handset features etc, see my TomiAhonen Phone Book 2012

Nokia Disaster Told One Picture at a Time: Today Picture 7: When is a Platform "Burning": The Test Of CEO Sanity (alternately titled:) Is Elop Really This Delusional?

So we continue the Nokia management disaster, studied through a single issue, and single picture per blog. Today we examine management judgement by CEO Stephen Elop. So before I continue, this is a series of blog articles to study the Nokia mess.

So far we've done: the Nokia smartphone unit sales collapse due to the Elop Effect, the competitive picture of Nokia vs Apple and Samsung, Nokia market failure in context of other historical handset industry collapses, the failure of the promised migration from Symbian to Windows Phone, the disasterous Lumia sales pattern using the Windows Phone system and the Revenue Collapse in Nokia's handset business. For those who may wonder am I nit-picking some extreme data points on a personal vendetta or agenda, this is Nokia's official filing to the USA SEC and NY Stock Exchange of the full set of risks to the new strategy as announced by Elop in February 2011. I have not invented these problems, they were clearly stated by Nokia two YEARS ago as so dangerous, they may jeopardize Nokia's profitable handset business. Please read the official Nokia corporation filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission in their long and explicit risk assessment in their Form 20-F two years ago.

Now lets examine whats going on inside the head of the CEO who wants to be called 'The General' and who pretends to be a strategic thinker. Elop's name will always be tied to the most damaging management memo of all time, the so-called 'Burning Platforms' memo. A memo which cost Nokia 13 Billion dollars of revenues wiped out, and 4 Billion dollars of profits destroyed. A memo that Elop himself has since admitted, caused damage to Nokia smartphone sales. The costliest memo of all time. How can a CEO be allowed to destroy 13 Billion dollars of revenues - and wipe out 4 Billion dollars of profits - and allowed to remain in charge? Why is Elop still running Nokia. I have started an 'Elop Firing Watch' via Twitter, where my followers picked dates of when they think Elop will be fired.

WHEN IS A PLATFORM ON FIRE

So we come to today's picture. This is a picture about the mental ability of CEO Stephen 'Call Me The General' Elop. Is he really a sharp, strategic thinker. Or is he a delusional psychopath. Lets remember, delusion is a severe insanity of the kind, where a madman looks at facts, refuses to accept them, and substitues his/her own alternate imagined fantasy instead of reality.

This is Nokia's situation as of February 2011 and as of February 2012. So the data is according to the just-ended fiscal years (2010 and 2011), after Nokia has just reported its final annual results at the end of January. This is what Nokia looked like, and what Elop, the Chief Executive Officer said about his company and its smartphone business at the time:




This picture may be freely shared

On February 9, 2011, looking at the just-ended, just-reported Nokia fiscal year 2010, Nokia's new CEO sees Nokia is more than twice as big as its nearest rivals including Apple's iPhone - and Nokia grew more in 2010 than Apple so the gap between Nokia's smartphone and Apple was increasing - Apple was not catching up, Nokia was pulling away from Apple. Nokia set a world record in growth in smartphones in 2010. Nokia did this profitably - how profitably? Nokia set a Nokia-record in growth in revenues and a Nokia record in profits in its smarpthone unit - and the Nokia profitability in the smartphone unit grew towards the end of the year, setting also a Nokia quarterly growth record. Nokia's smartphone revenues were second largest in the industry behind only Apple's, and Nokia's profits were also second largest in the industry, behind only Apple's.

You are the biggest, you grow the fastest, you set a world record in growth. You do this with increasing revenues and increasing profits, both of those company-wide records. This, is what the CEO calls a strategy that is failing, and failing so badly, Nokia apparently needs desperately a new strategy, and Nokia is on a 'burning platform'. Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and to substitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

Then lets fast-forward 12 months. Nokia has announced the new strategy by Elop. The Nokia record-setting growth in smarpthone unit sales, turns into a world-record collapse in smartphone unit sales. Nokia proceeds to set a world record fall in smartphone revenues in that year. And Nokia produces its first-ever loss in the smartphone unit - thus a Nokia record failure in the unit that is supposed to deliver the future to Nokia.

You set an industry record crash in unit sales, an industry record collapse of revenues, and the unit that invented the smartphone and the only legacy handset maker to do profits with smartphone sales in every single quarter of smartphone existence, suddenly produces a loss. This, the CEO now says that Nokia is "no longer on a burning platform", and that "Nokia's future is secure", and Nokia is in "an era of growth". Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and tosubstitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

I am not making this up. Elop looked at Nokia's record-setting industry-crushing dominating year 2010 in smartphone growth, highly profitably, and sees 'distress' and 'disater' and 'failure' and panics, and abandons Nokia's winning ways, and issues his Burning Platforms memo (totally full of delusional lies by the way). Elop says that Nokia has "fallen behind" the competition and if continues on the same path (that had just grown faster than the competition) Nokia would "get further and further behind, while our competitors advance". That was February 9, 2011, two years ago.

Then yes, Nokia went to set a world record failure in handsets, Nokia fell in the next year, 2011, worse than Motorola or Palm or Siemens or RIM. Nokia literally set a world record collapse in handsets. The unit sales set a record in collapse, Nokia smartphone revenue fall is a world record, and the perennially secure profit-machine was turned upside-down to produce its first-ever loss. This, the CEO says on February 13, 2013 in an interview to Business Day that "Nokia is no longer on the edge of a burning platform" and "Nokia's future is secure" and Nokia is "facing a new era of growth."

Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and to substitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

ELOP WAS THE ARSONIST

The Nokia smartphone platform was not on fire in 2010. Nokia was more than twice as big as its nearest rivals - this is such enormous dominance of an industry, that Toyota has never enjoyed such a massive overpowering lead in cars. Neither has GM or Renault or Volkswagen or Fiat - ever. That dominance is so huge, Hewlett-Packard has never had the pleasure of being twice as big as its nearest PC maker rival. Nor has Dell, nor has Lenovo or IBM or Apple or Compaq or Toshiba or Acer or Asus or Fujitsu etc. But not just was Nokia twice as big as its nearest rivals - Apple's iPhone and RIM's Blackberry in smartphones, Nokia was growing more in 2010 than its nearest rivals - the gap was increasing. Nokia did this with highly profitable business, with increasing revenues and increasing profits. Towards the end of the year, when Elop took over, Nokia's smarpthone unit average sales prices jumped up at a Nokia-record, the revenues for the first time grew bigger than the traditional 'featurephones' ie 'dumbphone' unit - and the jump in Nokia's profitability set a Nokia-record. Nokia's loyalty was so strong, in an independent UK survey by Right Mobile Phone Nokia's customer base had the highest retention rate of any handset brand.

Nokia's Symbian was the bestselling smartphone OS, and it was the biggest OS by installed base, and it was the bestselling smartphone OS in China, the world's largest individual country market for smartphones, and Symbian was the bestselling smarpthone OS on the continent that sold most smartphnoes, Europe. Symbian was the bestselling smartphone in the country with the biggest growth of mobile in 2010, India, as well as the bestselling smartphone in the continent with the biggest growth of mobile, Africa. Nokia's Ovi was the second bestselling app store behind only Apple's iPhone App Store, except that Ovi was available with over 100 carriers supporting it, with apps in over 60 languages, growing far faster than Apple's iPhone App Store. Nokia's Qt was being introduced as the app developer tool to provide apps across multiple smartphone platforms including Symbian, Maemo, MeeGo Moblin, initially, and soon also Blackberry, Android as well as the featurephones running Nokia S40. Qt would shortly reach twice as many devices as the installed base of Windows on PCs, tablets, and smartphones.

This is what the CEO calls a 'burning platform' and forces Nokia to quit the winning - not winning, utterly DOMINATING strategy, and instead to select the weakest, tiniest, unproven, unloved platform by the company known for plunging its 'partners' to loss-making and bankruptcy, Microsoft. When you take a winning strategy and turn it into world-record collapse - you have set your platform on fire. You, CEO Stephen 'Call Me The General' Elop are an arsonist. There was no fire on Nokia's platform, Stephen 'Call Me the General' Elop. No. There was no fire. The platform was not burning. You set it on fire, Mr Pretend-Patton. You, and only you. Nokia's smartphone platform was the strongest in the industry in 2010, by far the most overpowering, winning, dominating strategy. 77% market share in the world's biggest smarpthone market, China! The strongest loyalty in the UK. The second-biggest app store in the world, closing in on number 1, Apple. Nokia record profits, Nokia record revenues and the world's biggest smartphone unit sale growth. There was no fire on that platform at Nokia. You took it, and set it on fire. You are a menace. You are a psycopath!

NOW WHAT OF YEAR 2012

Lets fast-forward to today. Now we have seen a second year in the Elop new strategy era. This is what the picture looks like now. Nokia has broken its own record in failure, yes, setting a new world record collapse in smarpthone unit sales, to catastrophic levels in 2012, and also set a new world record in smartphone revenue crash, and now Nokia also sets a world record loss in smartphone sales. What does the CEO think of this performance?




This picture may be freely shared

Now just over a week ago, Elop told us that he is "very encouraged" that Nokia's "execution against our business strategy" has "started to translate into financial results". Financial 'results' yes, if by results you mean not just Nokia-record losses, but handset industry record level losses. That is a 'financial result' yes, but not one that any CEO would be 'very encouraged' by, unless it is your intention to destroy Nokia?

Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and to substitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

In 2012, Nokia took its own world record collapse in smartphone unit failure, and managed to do even worse, setting a new world record in failure. Nokia took its record-setting revenue collapse in smartphone sales, while the global smartphone industry exploded growing over 40% in units and over 30% in revenues, and Elop managed to wipe out 55% of Nokia smartphone unit sales and 50% of Nokia smartphone revenues - from year 2011 that was already a world record setting failure year for Nokia and Elop's new strategy. The defintion of insanity is to do the same thing and to expect a different result. In 2012, Nokia took its company-record loss in the smartphone unit, and made it far worse, producing a world record loss by any smarpthone maker, in 2012.

Nokia's new Lumia smartphones running the Windows Phone by Microsoft, are the worst smartphones Nokia has ever launched. With the last edition of Symbian, a new launch of a new version of Symbian did 5 million units in one quarter in Q4 of 2010. Now with these new Lumia smarpthones, after 5 quarters, Nokia has yet to even match that in any quarter, the very best that Lumia has managed is a paltry 4.4 million units - five quarters after launch - while the smartphone market has more than doubled in size in the mean time. The Lumia series is plagued with failures and problems and bugs. The Lumia buyers hate the devices so much, in an independent survey of Lumia buyers by Yankee Group in 2012, four out of ten Lumia buyers rated it the worst phone they had ever seen. The loyalty of the Windows Phone series is so bad, the Bernstein survey of smartphone brand loyalty found that two out of three who were hoodwinked into buying a Lumia, hate it so much, they will definitely never buy another Windows Phone smarpthone again! 

The Lumia series has the hightest return rates of any phone made by Nokia ever (customer returning phones after purchase). The Lumia series has the lowest resale value of any Nokia phone ever released, in many markets the resale value is already zero. It may amuse American readers but yes, in Africa, India, Indonesia, Brazil, China, much of the rest of the world, handsets are sold second-hand, like cars. Your resale value is a significant factor in how much you are willing to pay for your new phone, especially as most people live in countries where phones are not subsidised by the carriers and sold on 2 year contracts. Consumers pay full retail prices for their handsets, ie the real price of an iPhone is 640 dollars, not the 179 dollars that AT&T advertises on a 2 year contract. Back to Lumia, the European carriers for example said, that the Lumia series is not suitable for European consumers, and the carriers have effectively boycotted Lumia sales from the start. The very latest survey by the Telegraph in the UK this past week found that in-store sales staff won't offer Lumias to customers asking for smartphones, they offer Samsung Galaxies instead.

The Windows ecosystem is dead, it is the sixth of six, literally the smallest in existence. It has not been growing, it has been shrinking. The Windows ecosystem has a modest catalog of apps primarily because Nokia was paying app developers to build Windows versions of their apps (and so did Microsoft too, offer payments when developers simply refused to bother to develop apps to the tiny ecosystem). The traffic generated by Windows Phone apps is so miniscule it doesn't register on most measurements, while ironically, Symbian still runs biggest or second biggest app environment on the three most populous of the six inhabited continents.

Elop looks at record failing Nokia smartphone unit sales, record collapsing Nokia smartphone revenues, and hideously huge losses - for the full year the Nokia smarpthone unit generated a 2 Billion dollar loss, at one point in Q3 when pushing the Lumia series very hard, Nokia was making a 49% loss per smartphone sold! This compares to a 2 Billion dollar profit Nokia made just before this mad Microsoftian misadventure that Elop calls a new strategy. Elop sees collapsing sales, record-setting revenue crash and massively growing 2 billion dollar loss - and he says he is "very encouraged" that his strategy is now succeeding? That his strategy has "started to translate into financial results" Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and to substitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

WHAT DOES DELUSIONAL CEO DO?

Can a CEO be this mad? How can Nokia's Board accept the management of a madman? Why is Nokia led by the leadership of a lunatic? This is what happens if a delusional psycopath is in charge:

Nokia invented the smartphone and the first Nokia smartphone had a full QWERTY keyboard. Nokia's business-oriented E-Series on Symbian was renown for its wide range of QWERTY keyboards and the heavily texting-addicted youth were often selecting Nokia QWERTY based smartphones. About one in three Nokia smartphones sold globally have had QWERTY keyboards historically. Elop admits to having had 'internal debates' about QWERTY. The Lumia series has introduced 9 devices so far, not one of them has a physical QWERTY keyboard in any form factor. Elop has voluntarily abandoned one third of Nokia's loyal custoemr base with this one moronic move. Only a delusional psycopath looks at facts, is able to actively ignore the truth, and subtitute his own hallucination in the place of reality.

Nokia announces the new superphone the N9 with MeeGo. The press love the phone. After Nokia's share price has been in free-fall for five months, suddenly on the N9 news, Nokia's share price jumps 5%. Any sane CEO would celebrate and be seen everywhere with the new superphone. Elop announces to Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat, that no matter how well the N9 will sell, Nokia will not release more phones to run on MeeGo. WTF ? Can you see Steve Jobs ever saying something that moronic? Can you see Steve Ballmer - hardly a rocket scientist among CEOs, himself listed as one of the worst CEOs in the world - but would Ballmer say, that if the next Xbox is a success, he won't do more of them? What CEO takes a highly praised product, and kills its future? Only a delusional CEO can do that.

Nokia's traditional stregth is the camera. Nokia's own internal surveys reveal, year after year, that the camera is the number 1 reason what Nokia smartphone buyers want when buying a Nokia branded smartphone. Nokia has had a 12 megapixel flagship smarpthone since 2010 and on Symbian, introduces the industry-shattering 808 Pureview with its 41 megapixel monster-sensor in 2012. And once again, Nokia itself says in 2012, that yes, Nokia customers number 1 request is the camera. Nokia wins best cameraphone year after year after year in survey after survey, from the N93 to the N95 to the N9 to the 808 Pureview. Yet the delusional CEO looks at the facts, and decides he has a better imaginary reality inside his head, and he regresses, releasing puny 8 megapixel cameras on THREE SUCCESSIVE flagships on the Lumia series. So bad, that even in 2012, the old 2010 Symbian based flagship N8 wins in side-by-side camera tests (and the N8 still registers in December 2012, among the top 5 bestselling Nokia smartphones sold in China for example when the phone is literally more than 2 years old and 9 newer Lumia phones have been released)

Nokia's biggest rival is Samsung. Samsung competes against top end smartphones, in mid-priced featurephones and in low-cost dumbphones. Samsung is the only rival to match up to Nokia in every country and in most markets Samsung and Nokia were numbers 1 and 2 back in 2010. When Elop wrote his Burning Platforms memo, Nokia was 50% bigger than Samsung in dumbphones and 4x bigger in smartphones. Elop in his memo lists many competitors - including Google who is perhaps Microsoft's rival, but as Google didn't make handsets, smartphones nor networking equipment, Google was not in any way Nokia's significant rival in 2010. But Elop ignored Samsung? Then in February 2011, when Elop was asked about Samsung, he said, he does not lose any sleep over Samsung !!! At that very moment, Samsung passed Nokia as the world's biggest handset maker. It had already passed Nokia as the world's biggest smartphone maker. Today Samsung is 6 times bigger than Nokia in smartphones and produces the second largest profits in handsets, behind only Apple. Elop said he didn't lose any sleep over Samsung. Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and to substitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

Nokia's MeeGo based 'Searay' handset is selected by Verizon as their Nokia return handset. Verizon love MeeGo and the Searay. Nokia has for years hoped to return to the US market. Any sane CEO would tell Verizon, you will get it. But Elop? He refuses to let Verizon get the Searay, and rather bastadizes the Searay, forces it to use Windows Phone - and when Verizon see the Lumia 800, they say no way. Nokia lose a year of Verizon sales. Only a delusional CEO can behave like this.

Nokia's N9 is released in September 2011 and immediately achieves in side-by-side tests, the astonishing rating by practically all tech tests, that it is better than the iPhone !!! There has never been a Nokia smarpthone that regularly beats the iPhone (the E90 Communicator was the last Nokia smartphone to manage it but only occasionally, not consistently). This is not just the only Nokia smartphone consistently ranked better than the iPhone, it is the ONLY smartphone by ANY BRAND to do that consistently. Also the MeeGo OS is rated superior to the iPhone iOS - something Windows, Blackberry, Android, Symbian etc have never achieved. So any reasonable CEO of course would rush to launch the N9 to every strong iPhone market like the USA, France, UK, etc. What does Elop do? He forbids the release of the N9 to any strong iPhone markets? Remember, this is at the time when Nokia is setting global records for smarpthone sales collapse and producing massive losses, with its factories idling. The N9 is a highly profitable smarpthone commanding premium prices. What idiot CEO refuses to let the N9 be sold? Only a delusional psycopath can look at the facts - that the new Nokia N9 is better than the iPhone - and then explicitly forbid its sale in any market where the iPhone is strong. What is wrong with Elop? 

THe 808 Pureview is released in February 2012 and its demand highly exceeds Nokia production. The 808 Pureview instantly is heralded as the best cameraphone of all time. The 808 Pureview runs on Symbian using traditional Nokia strengths, and has lots of abilities and features that Windows Phone cannot support. The smart CEO would take the high popularity and visibility of the 808 Pureview, and rush to release a series of Pureview smarpthones, the 818 Pureview with QWERTY slider. the 707 Pureview with a slightly smaller sensor like 22 megapixels, but stll far bigger than any current rivals. And for Christmas 2012, produce the uberphone, the 909 Pureview with a 50 megapixel sensor, and optical zoom. Right? Nokia itself admits, the demand for the Pureview was far higher than Nokia anticipated. This is a hit phone! It won all awards in 2012 for best cameraphone. And most Nokia customers came in asking for a good camera. Any smart CEO would have produced a family of Pureview with Symbian, especially as Nokia factories are idling and Elop himself promised 150 million more Symbian while he has only delivered 74 million so far. And with no royalties paid to anyone, Nokia can do Symbian far cheaper than for example Lumia where Nokia has to pay a royalty to Microsoft. If the 808 Pureview was a failure, it makes sense to end it. If the Pureview is in such high demand Nokia can't keep up, any sane CEO would rush a series of sister products. But not Elop. Nokia now announced there will be no more Symbian based smarpthones, even as Windows Phone cannot support nearly all the features that make the 808 Pureview the best cameraphone on the planet.

Delusion is the type insanity where you are able to look at facts, refuse to accept them, and to substitute an imagined fantasy insteady of the reality.

I could go on and on and on and on. Nokia's CEO is delusional. He looks at Nokia performance and cannot relate to it. He does not see success as success, he seems to want to destroy any success he finds. Elop is to success what water is to fire. Elop found the strongest smartphone global juggernaut, and set it on fire like an arsonist. He then looks at the disasterous failure and calls it a success. Elop is dangerous as a CEO, not dangerous to his rivals, dangerous to his own employees, to his own Board, to his own shareholders and investors. Why is a delusional psycopath allowed to remain in control of Nokia?

For those who didn't like my little clown-faces, I have created a cleaner version of the picture. If you want to write about this story and use my pictures, you may prefer this one, haha. Feel free.




This picture may be freely shared

This was part 7 in the Nokia disaster. Elop has presided over the world-record collapse of a dominating juggernaut. Elop is literally the worst CEO of all time. Unfortunately this series is nowhere nearly done, I will return with more articles in the series, always one picture and one angle to the mess that did not exist before Elop, but what was caused by Elop.

(I need to point out, Nokia was in trouble before Elop, yes, Nokia corporation, not Nokia smarpthones. Nokia had trouble with 'execution' not its smartphones strategy. Nokia needed help in execution, delivering new phones on time and without bugs. Elop did not address those - his new Lumia phones have been plagued with more errors and bugs than any Nokia phones ever before, including the notorious N97. What Elop did, was to see that there was a problem, ignored it, and created a new problem. Its like a doctor, who arrives at an accident scene, sees that a patient has lost a leg and the leg needs to be cleaned and properly amputated. Then the doctor rather than attending the leg, decides to cut off an arm from the patient.. Elop has found problems at Nokia, ignored those, but created new problems of his own - wait, this is EXACTLY like Elop, the Delusional Psycopath)

Stay tuned, more troubles coming from the Nokia saga told one picture at a time. And for those who missed it, we have an 'Elop Firing Watch' on the blog, a contest to guess what date is Elop fired from Nokia. (that date cannot come too soon, and will probably be named a national holiday in Finland, haha) The contest has over 100 entries..

Countdown to Mobile Moment - When Will Mobile Phone Accounts Outnumber Humans? I say July 2013 (we are at 6.7B already)

So its that monster year not just in mobile and tech, but in human history. We will experience the Mobile Moment this year, 2013. The moment in time when human evolution reaches the point, where a single consumer gadget exceeds the total human population by users. So we are now counting down to yes, the moment when mobile phone accounts, or 'subscriptions' or some may say 'users' or 'mobile phones' will exceed the total human population alive. Not measured in household penetration rates, nor of adults, but measured in total humans alive.

Never in human history has any gadget or technology achieved 100% penetration levels. Not cars, not motorbikes and mopeds, not even bicycles. Not the Walkman, not the CD player, not the television, Playstation, VCR, DVD player nor even radio. Not the PC, not the internet. Not even such basic necessities we all expect, like running water or electricity. The wristwatch may have seemed ubiquitous, but it wan't. It never reached every wrist. The pen and paper technology, basic pencils, do not reach the total human population because still 800 million adults on the planet are illiterate and have no use for such a technology. But even illiterate humans, beyond the reach of electricity are using mobile phones today. (yes in many parts of Africa and Asia and Latin America, schools provide free recharging service for mobile phones, as an incentive to have the parents send the kids to schoo. and get their phones recharged, for those living in villages and farms that don't have electricity)

But mobile. Mobile reached 6.7 Billion active accounts/subscriptions last year by December 2012, and grew from a little over 6 Billion, adding over 650 million new accounts ie grew new paying users by 11% in just one year. (Isn't this an awesome industry, the fastest-growing Trillion-dollar industry in human history, and the epicenter of all digital convergence). And how, this year, we will definitely add at least another 600 million, probably even more than that. So this is the historic year, when we will have the 'Mobile Moment'. A gadget or technology will grow to become bigger than total human population. Mobile accounts already are bigger than the populations of Europe, Oceania, Latin America, the Middle East and even North America. Asia is almost at 100% and Africa will reach 100% penetration rate level well before this decade is done (they are already past 70% penetration rate). Leading countries are past 200% like the UAE and Hong Kong.

So now we are on the countdown to the Mobile Moment. When will it happen? My current projections say it will happen in July of 2013. The planet is at 7.07 Billion humans and we are at 6.71 Billion mobile subscriptions now in January 2013. We are growing new mobile accounts at a rate of about 54 million per month.

Now, remember, the total mobile subscription count is not the same as actual mobile phones in use (that is less, as some will have multiple accounts but use one phone, and do the SIM-card-switch between different carriers/operators to save in costs or optimize in telecoms traffic behavior). Also remember, because some of us have two phones, and others who have one phone have more than one account, and as some of the mobile accounts are actually machine-accounts (electric meters, watering irrigation systems, healthcare warning systems etc) the actual number of 'unique users' as human beings is well below that magical number. But these are the numbers at the end of 2012:

MOBILE SUBCRIBERS, PHONES, AND USERS AT END OF 2012
Planet . . . . . . . . . . 7.1 Billion humans
Mobile accounts . . . 6.7 Billion total active subscriptions (94% of all humans)
Phones in use . . . .  5.2 Billion including those with 2 phones (73% of all humans)
Unique users . . . . . 4.3 Billion humans who have at least one phone and account (60% of all humans)
Source: TomiAhonen Almanac 2013
This data may be freely shared

Lets see as the numbers start to come in. I expect some analysts to jump on the mobile moment number earlier, and also, that as we'll hit the 7.0 Billion active accounts number before technically passing human population count at almost 7.1 Billion, we may see the seven billion number celebrated around May or June.

But yes, this is the monster number coming this year. It will be widely reported and a lot of pundits will give their commentary on fhis pervasive technology. So a few quick thoughts - most of those phones in use are not smartphones (only 1.1 Billion were at the end of last year). The number 1 used service on those mobile devices is no longer voice calls, it is SMS text messaging. More than two out of three phones in use is a cameraphone so for most humans on the planet, the only camera they have ever used, was on a phone, not a stand-alone Canon or Nikon or Olympus haha..

As to services, more than a third of these mobile phone users access the internet on their phones at least part of the time and nearly a third access news on their phones. 60% of mobile phone owners have received advertising on their phones already so mobile is becoming the biggest advertising platform by reach, totally dwarfing television, print and the PC based legacy internet, and rivalled only by radio anymore. And yes, obviously, all data in this blog may be freely shared and re-used and translated and turned into infographics etc.. Please provide links back here if you do and also tell me via Twitter - I am @tomiahonen of course - and I'll tweet links to your articles that talk about these numbers.

I'll be giving you a lot more data on the mobile industry as we near the publication date for the brand new TomiAhonen Almanac 2013 edition, but if you wanted all the mobile data in an ebook/mbook that you can save on your tablet, laptop or smartphone - now's the time to order the TomiAhonen Almanac 2012. Anyone who buys the old edition now, gets the new edition also, for the same low price of ony 9.99 Euros. A great value on the 180 page statistical compendium of all major mobile industry stats. So check out the TomiAhonen Almanac 2012.