iPhone’s sales in Japan

One of my Japanese friends told me that the iPhone was unlikely to sell well in Japan. So, I researched whether this would be true or not on the Japanese site.

First of all, I couldn’t find the hard fact regarding bad sales performance of iPhones. On the other hand, I couldn’t find any relevant facts that SoftBank Mobile, the iPhone carrier in Japan, has enjoyed large sales.

Instead, there are many consumers’ complaints about it: no demountable battery, can’t use picture language in email* which almost all Japanese girls and young women(sometimes boys and young men) love to use, can’t take moving pictures, the battery runs out at an early date, bad usability especially in Japanese character entry and so on.
*In Japan they don’t usually use text messages.

One of my friends also said that in Japan when they get on a train (or a tube) and write email with their mobile handsets, they usually use one hand and hold on to a strap with another hand, so iPhone is tricky to write an email. Furthermore, young girls (or women) tend to use their nails when they write emails with their mobile phones. In that case it is difficult for them to write emails with iPhone.

I’m not sure about the fact but I guess if iPhone shows a good sales performance, SoftBank Mobile will announce the number officially, but unfortunately they haven’t done it so far.

Finally, some of you might know that on 27 February SoftBank Mobile has introduced a new pricing plan that gives iPhone (8GB) away for free with a new two-year contract. (It will be available until 31 May.)

I’m not sure either exactly what this plan means. (but it has a kind of bad sales air about it!)

Development of the Japanese Broadband Market 7

Last time I wrote why VOD services are not so popular in Japan despite a high penetration rate of optical fibres. This time I will write about opportunities for VOD services in Japan.

First, NHK, Japan’s public broadcaster, offered a new VOD service called NHK on demand last December. The service is available from the next day after NHK has broadcasted its programmes, people can watch them for one week through broadband services. They can also choose programmes from its archived programmes. It costs from 300 yen (£1.5) to 1470 yen (£12) per month.

In reaction to NHK’s movement to offer their programmes with VOD services, other commercial broadcasters have gradually started to offer VOD services. Therefore, the reluctance from broadcast stations to offer VOD services of their programmes is diminishing.

Second, as you know there are many free VOD service providers such as YouTube. However, it is said that from an advertisers’ point of view, they are worried about placing their ads on such kinds of VOD services because they are not sure about what kinds of VOD services their ads are placed on.

On the other hand, we also have another type of VOD services where VOD service providers offer particular films or other programmes for free. In that case, advertisers can get to know which films (or programmes) their ads are placed on. However, so far one of the problems about those kinds of VOD services has been that we don’t know how many people actually watch the VOD service. So, those VOD services haven’t succeeded as well. But, last year major VOD service providers decided to make criteria about audience rates and viewership and have been making systems for them. So, it is said that if they can offer such kinds of data to advertisers, they will be get more advertising revenue.

A survey shows that people want to watch VOD services with ads rather than pay ones. (65% of them prefer VOD services with ads. N=2,087) Therefore, I think the second generation of VOD services have a certain likelihood of success.