Nokia positioning themselves to grab the Low Cost Phone Market around the world

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Looking back at some of my rss feeds, I stumbled on this piece of jewel that was not really reported by American blogs at all but I think validates Nokia’s strategy with what’s been going on recently on the high end smartphone market. Make sure you listen to our podcast tomorrow because we’ll have an in-depth analysis of all this.

A NEW report published by Juniper Research forecasts that, between this year and 2014, annual sales of low-cost mobile handsets will rise by 22 percent to over 700 million.

The research said this will be driven by operators and device manufacturers increasingly looking to emerging markets like Africa to fuel future growth The Africa & Middle East region will account for the largest annual shipment volume by 2014, with its 166 million low-cost handsets representing 24% of all sales that year and up by 54 percent over the term of the forecast period, Juniper said.

“Efforts by industry players to lower the TCO (total cost of ownership) for devices and services to below $5 are already reaping benefits.

Players such as Nokia are developing invaluable content-driven services that will encourage first-time mobile users to keep on using their devices and improving their standards of living,” Junipe said.

According to the Low-Cost Handsets Report author Andrew Kitson, “With around 80 percent of new mobile users set to come from emerging markets over the next six years, it is essential that operators and vendors work together to dilute the price barriers associated with mobile technology and to provide ongoing support through the development of specific social and personal services, such as Nokia’s Life Tools suite.

However, it is clear that commercial success will only be achieved if operators adopt revolutionary new business models and if governments can be persuaded not to place excessive taxes and duties on device sales and imports.”

via IT News Africa