Posts tagged sales
NEC Medias: World’s Slimmest Smartphone Tops Japanese Cell Phone Sales Charts
Apr 1st
The NEC Medias is not only “the world’s slimmest smartphone”, it’s also selling really well. The handset, which we have shown you last month, was the best-selling cell phone in Japan between March 14 and March 20, according to market research firm Gfk Japan [JP].
To recap, the NEC Medias is just 8.7mm thick and features a 4-inch LCD touchscreen with 480 x 854 resolution, Android 2.2, a 5.1MP CMOS camera, a digital TV tuner, e-wallet function, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth Version 2.1+ EDR, a microSDHC card slot etc.
Here’s the full top 10:
- NEC Medias
- iPhone 4 / 16GB
- Sharp IS05
- iPhone 4 / 32GB
- Samsung Galaxy S
- Sharp SH009
- Toshiba IS04
- Panasonic P-07B
- Kyocera Kantan Keitai K005
- Sharp IS03
Via IT Media [JP]
From www.mobilecrunch.com
Girl Scout cookie sales jump with cell phone device.
Mar 30th
If all goes well, Love plans to roll out the device to all 2,700 troops in northeast Ohio. Ten troops in San Diego are also testing out the device this month.
“I know there’s a lot of interest across the country with other Girl Scout councils,” Love said. “So I wouldn’t be surprised if you see it everywhere this time next year.”
GoPayment is just one of several popular mobile payment devices that took off in 2010, with hundreds of thousands of people signing up to use them, said Todd Ablowitz, president of Double Diamond Group of Centennial, Colo., a consulting company focused on the mobile payment industry.
“Everyone from delivery drivers to Girl Scouts to baby sitters are swiping cards on their phones to take a payment,” Ablowitz said. “I mean, this barely existed before 2010. The numbers are staggering.”
The technology has actually existed for years, but it wasn’t until San Francisco-based Square, Inc., began offering its card readers for free that the industry really gained momentum, Ablowitz said.
Intuit, the Mountain View-based company that manufactures GoPayment, charges a small fee per transaction and offers various pricing plans to customers based on sales volume. GoPayment has been on the market for about two years. Intuit charges the Girl Scouts its lowest rate, at 1.7% plus 15 cents per transaction. Most customers pay 2.7% per transaction.
“We saw people that wanted to take electronic payments and just didn’t have a way to do it,” said Chris Hylen of Intuit.
Sales are already picking up in Ohio, with one troop reporting selling 20% more than they did in the same location the previous year, Love said.
Selling cookies is a massive and lucrative operation for the Girl Scouts, hauling in about $714 million every year.
Valley cookie sales
Time is running out to buy this year’s Girl Scout cookies locally.
Sales began March 4 and were scheduled to end last weekend. Because of the stormy weather, however, Girl Scouts of Central California South in Fresno has extended cookie sales through Sunday. Officials are calling it “Last Chance Weekend.”
At girlscoutsccs.org, you can find a booth near you by entering a ZIP code. There are 686 locations between Madera and Bakersfield.
Monica Rivera, product sales manager of the Girl Scouts of Central California South, says cookie buyers can also still donate cases of cookies to U.S. troops through its “Operation Gratitude” offer.
Details: (800) 490-8653.
From www.fresnobee.com
Android tablet sales to ‘dominate’ over the iPad by 2014
Mar 4th
10. As bubbahotepuk says, I think there’s always gonna be a role for Apple gear – people like it. As everyone finds, it does the jobs that many people want it to. But lots of people (me included) want more. It may take a while for developers and communities to catch up with the groovy trails that Apple blazes (I’ll admit freely, the iphone & ipad does some really cool stuff) but their model isn’t really about enabling users to do much outside of the sandpit they offer.
Look at mobile phones. Iphone comes out. Blows everyone away for a bit. But then the world catches up and sneaks into the lead in lots of ways. I have a warmed over Orange San francisco running cyanogenmod7 – basically android 2.3.3, gingerbread. This is a 100ish phone that can fight it out with an iPhone 4 and only really lose out big on build quality. But iphone lovers wouldn’t like it cos it takes a bit of maintainence. These are different markets – different ecosystems. Maybe in a year or two android’s usability will have reached a point where Apple buyers aren’t prepared to pay a premium for the badge alone, but maybe it won’t.
I guess Apple’s always gonna have to keep developing to stay ahead of the game. And if they can, good luck to them, but they’re gonna have to be quick about it, cos Android’s caught up with them on mobile handsets already, and is breathing down their neck with tablets (Honeycomb is bloody marvellous – and bizarrely available for my little Orange Sanfrancisco ALREADY!)
From www.techradar.com
Mobile Gift Cards Increase Gift Card Sales for Small Businesses
Feb 25th
Company News: Page (1) of 1 – 02/25/11 email article print page More Related Stories
Mobile Gift Cards Increase Gift Card Sales for Small Businesses (February 25, 2011)
Boulder, CO, February 25, 2011 –(PR.com)– Businesses using GiftCardGreatness.com to sell gift cards online can now offer another choice to their customers: mobile gift cards, or m-gift cards. M-gift cards are instant gift cards sent by text message to the recipient’s cell phone.
To purchase m-gift cards, customers simply click a link on the business’s website, and arrive at a custom GiftCardGreatness.com page created for that business. The customer can then select the value of the gift card, add a personal message, and enter the cell phone number of the recipient. m-gift cards can be sent to any cell phone number. When the customer submits his or her order, the m-gift will arrive on the recipient’s phone in the time it takes to send a text message.
GiftCardGreatness.com is a full-service solution from Smart Transaction Systems that allows small businesses to sell gift cards online without the overhead of launching and managing an e-commerce site. Businesses can use GiftCardGreatness.com to sell electronic gift cards, known as e-gift cards, sent instantly by email; physical gift cards, sent by mail; and now m-gift cards.
“Normally we help small and regional merchants to do things that the large national chains are already doing. The interesting aspect of this development is that we now have small merchants utilizing a technology that very few of the national chains have caught on to yet. The small merchants that we are working with are now offering their customers something that the vast majority of large retailers have not yet made available to their customers,” said Ray Clopton, President of Smart Transaction Systems. “We’re very proud of that accomplishment because our goal is to is to provide small businesses with the tools they need to compete with the big guys. M-gift cards are a great addition to GiftCardGreatness.com and it is fully integrated with our mobile marketing and customer loyalty platforms.”
M-gift cards help businesses capture revenue they might otherwise have lost by offering relevant products to specific segments of their customer bases: teens and last-minute gift-givers. Therefore, m-gift cards benefit customers in ways e-gift cards cannot. For example, a parent can send an m-gift card to his or her teenage child shopping at the mall, who will receive the gift instantly, whereas an e-gift card might go unnoticed until later. With an m-gift card, the surprised and grateful teen will be able to redeem his or her gift card instantly by presenting the text message to the cashier at the mall store the gift card is issued for.
Merchants or resellers interested in using GiftCardGreatness.com to sell a variety of gift card products can obtain more information by contacting STS at 888-494-9760 or visiting GiftCardGreatness.com
###
Contact Information:
Smart Transaction Systems
Sarah Miller
888-494-9760
sarah@smarttransactions.com
www.smarttransactions.com
Click here to read the full story: Mobile Gift Cards Increase Gift Card Sales for Small Businesses
Press Release Distributed by PR.com
Copyright 2010 PR.com
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From dmnnewswire.digitalmedianet.com
BCE’s Q4 profit jumps 25 per cent on wireless sales
Feb 10th
MONTREAL A strong performance by the wireless division of Bell Canada helped its parent company BCE Inc. to a 25 per cent jump in fourth-quarter profit, driven in no small part by its high-value mobile phone customers.
Profits rose 25.4 per cent to $439 million from $350 million in the comparable period of 2009, BCE reported Thursday.
The wireless division added almost 157,000 new customers on long-term contracts in what chief executive George Cope described as its best fourth quarter since 2002. A number of these customers were smartphone users on BlackBerrys, iPhones and Android devices — who typically generate high monthly revenue.
Cope said almost 30 per cent of its wireless customers on contracts are smartphone users, leaving plenty of room for more growth. He noted that the average monthly revenue generated by a smartphone customer is about $90.
He also said Bell now has 33 per cent of the market in customers on long-term contracts, up from 18 per cent three years ago, with Rogers and Telus sharing the remainder.
But in the lower end of the market, generally composed of prepaid phones for talking and texting, competition is fierce with new players like Public Mobile and Mobilicity. In this market, BCE didn’t fare as well.
The prepaid client base dropped by 39,926 in the quarter, compared with a gain of 52,938 in the same quarter last year, BCE said.
The Canadian Press
From www.thespec.com
Apple iPhone Sales Increase as Android Soars in Smartphone Market
Feb 9th
Apple iPhone Sales Increase as Android Soars in Smartphone Market 
0 comments Gartner reports worldwide Android smartphone sales rose almost 900% in 2010 as market share for the iPhone remained stagnant and Symbian fell hard
Worldwide sales of mobile phones reached a staggering 1.6 billion in 2010, according to a new Gartner report issued today, Wednesday 9th February. Year-on-year sales climbed 31.8%, fuelled by the growing success of smartphones which accounted for almost one-fifth of all mobile phones sold last year.
Android Invasion Continues with Symbian Ready to Fall
The biggest story of 2010 was the ongoing success of Google’s Android OS for smartphones, which accelerated to an 888% rise from 2009 to claim sales of over 67 million and a 22.7% worldwide market share of all smartphone sales. The Symbian OS from Nokia is now in its sights and Android is already on its way to being number one as it overtook sales of Symbian smartphones in the fourth quarter of 2010. This is also backed up by data from research firm Canalys whose own report issued at the end of January predicted Android to continue growing at least twice as fast as the smartphone market itself.
Despite an increase of over 30 million sales in 2010, market share for Symbian fell almost 7% to 37.6% as Nokia continued to struggle in the smartphone market. This share slid down further to just 32.6% in the fourth quarter of last year as Android outpaced the ailing OS in a greater range of devices from manufacturers like HTC, Motorola and Samsung.
Nokia also struggled in the worldwide mobile phone market as a whole. Despite a modest sales increase that kept it well ahead of its nearest rivals with more than a quarter of all mobile phone sales, its market share actually fell 7.5% as Symbian continued to lose out to more capable operating systems in the growing smartphone market.
Apple iPhone Sales Almost Double but Market Share Stagnant
Expansion into new countries and availability on more networks helped Apple increase sales of the iPhone by 87.2% to over 46 million, putting it less than a million units behind RIM and its BlackBerry brand. However, its focus on the high-end rather than the mass market meant that its share of the smartphone market only moved from 14.4% in 2009 to 15.7% last year.
Apple will likely still be pleased with their rising market share though, especially against BlackBerry smartphones which are available at a lower cost. Market share for the iPhone is set to increase further in 2011 as it becomes available on Verizon Wireless in the US and a new model is released. But RIM will be fighting to stay ahead of its rival and hoping that the release of the BlackBerry PlayBook tablet will create a halo effect that will push its smartphone sales up as well.
Microsoft Slides After Windows Phone 7 Launch
Despite launching its new smartphone OS in October, market share for Microsoft plummeted to just 4.2% as a result of almost three million fewer sales. This will come as a disappointment to Microsoft whose Windows Phone 7 OS has been generally well received and is supported by major manufacturers such as HTC and Samsung.
With overall sales of almost 300 million, the smartphone market continues to soar as more and more devices are introduced and their capabilities become increasingly enticing to consumers and businesses. But a report from Gartner in October also warned that there could be a significant impact on sales of high-end smartphones as a result of the growing number of seven-inch tablets so this remains a highly volatile market.
From www.suite101.com
Global Smartphone Sales Rose 72 Percent in 2010, Gartner Says
Feb 9th
Global Smartphone Sales Rose 72 Percent in 2010, Gartner Says February 09, 2011, 3:27 AM EST
By Diana ben-Aaron
Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) — Smartphone sales gained 72 percent last year, helping propel the worldwide mobile-phone market to 1.6 billion units, researcher Gartner Inc. said.
Research in Motion Ltd. and Apple Inc. became the fourth- and fifth-biggest mobile-phone companies, displacing Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB and the business now known as Motorola Mobility Holdings Inc., Stamford, Connecticut-based Gartner said today in an e-mailed report.
Handsets with Google Inc.’s Android software overtook Nokia’s sales of Symbian smartphones in the fourth quarter, Gartner said. Symbian remained the best-selling smartphone system overall as other manufacturers also have it on their devices, the researcher said. Nokia, which remained the biggest mobile-phone vendor, saw its market share drop to 28.9 percent from 36.4 percent in 2009. Gartner reports sales to end users.
“The decline is not solely attributable to Nokia’s continuing deficiency in high-end devices but is in part the result of the growth of legitimate white-box sales,” Carolina Milanesi, a Gartner analyst in Egham, U.K, said in the report.
So-called white box manufacturers, based mainly in China, produce small runs of mobile phones from standard components without the benefit of a major brand. White-box phones have expanded from the black market and informal channels to regular phone retailers, where they now sell in significant numbers and are tracked by researchers. Sales by such vendors reached 360 million units last year, Gartner said.
About half of all phones sold in western Europe and North America in the fourth quarter were smartphones, Gartner said. Android sales increased more than ninefold during the year.
Apple’s IPhone
Apple’s iPhone is now available from multiple operators in many markets, totaling 185 phone companies worldwide, Gartner said. Competition has reduced the price of data plans, though the selling price of the device is stable, according to the analysts.
“Apple is not targeting the mass market, which is a fundamental difference in approach from Android,” Gartner analysts said in the report.
South Korean mobile-phone makers, Samsung Electronics Co. and LG Electronics Inc., ranked second and third, respectively, on Gartner’s list.
–Editors: Vidya Root, Robert Valpuesta
To contact the reporter on this story: Diana ben-Aaron in Helsinki at dbenaaron1@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Vidya Root in Paris at vroot@bloomberg.net.
From www.businessweek.com
Prepaid users, mobile data lift Vodacom Q3 sales
Feb 2nd
By Gugulakhe Lourie
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) – Vodacom, South Africa’s largest mobile phone operator, overcame stiff competition to post a 6 percent rise in third-quarter sales, boosted by a surge in mobile data and strong prepaid growth.
Vodacom, which operates mainly in South Africa, the DRC and Tanzania, is fighting to keep market share from competitors such as MTN Group and India’s Bharti Airtel, both of which have a bigger presence across Africa.
“We are holding our market share, I think. We are competitive and our customers are growing strongly,” Pieter Uys, Vodacom chief executive, said on a conference call.
The company said it added 2.2 million mobile users in the three months to end-December, bringing its total to 41.6 million customers.
Investors cheered Vodacom’s continued growth, sending its shares up nearly 5 percent. The stock has risen sharply since last May but has dropped around 4 percent so far this year.
“It was a good performance, but I have concerns that this rate can be sustained in the next year or two,” said Irnest Kaplan at Kaplan Equity Analysts.
For Vodacom, its operations in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) remain a worry, having been locked in a long-running dispute with its joint venture partner.
Uys reiterated the group’s position that it may sell or buy out its partners, Congolese Wireless Network. Continued…
From af.reuters.com
Smartphones ‘account for 75 percent of mobile phone sales’
Jan 19th
Smartphones ‘account for 75 percent of mobile phone sales’
Smartphones with Google’s Android service sold more than iPhones last year, according to the Carphone Warehouse.
The mobile phone provider has released figures which show that 75% of the phones it sold in the last quarter of 2010 were smartphones.
This was an increase on the usual figures of around 50-60%.
Carphone Warehouse’s Chief Executive Roger Taylor told the Guardian: “At some point in 2010 the Android overtook every other operating platform.”
He added that he expected smartphones to move into the pay-as-you-go market this year, as currently they are only available on pre-pay contracts.
This news echoes recent findings by the International Data Corporation which suggested that smartphone sales had increased by almost 90% in the last year.
And another survey by PC World revealed just how dependent Brits are on their mobile phones, as smartphones offer users the opportunity to surf the internet whenever they like.
The research revealed that half of people admit to taking their mobile phone into the bath with them.
Posted by Ruth Bradshaw
From www.uswitch.com
Mobile Phone Sales Reach $4.6Bln in 2010
Jan 13th
By Valery Kodachigov / Vedomosti
Stimulated by increased demand for smart phones, overall mobile phone sales last year were about $500 million more than in 2009, with huge sales in December, though the average price per unit dropped.
Telephone sales at Mobile TeleSystems retail outlets last month increased by 40 percent in unit terms over December 2009 and by 60 percent in revenue terms, said MTS spokeswoman Irina Osadchaya.
Telephone sales by the company were up 25 percent in the final quarter of the year over the third quarter. High-performance smart phones accounted for almost all of that growth. Year on year, their sales were four times greater in December 2010 and the fourth quarter saw sales volume double.
Demand for smart phones increased significantly at the Bely Veter chain as well, according to company executive director Danila Vaskevich, with an 87 percent increase in sales in December 2010 compared with the previous year. The iPhone 4 and HTC Desire HD were the most popular models. The chain had a 30 percent year-on-year increase in revenue for December 2010.
A spokesman of Yevroset, the country’s largest cellular communications retailer, declined to comment on its sales, and the Svyaznoi chain did not respond to Vedomosti inquiries.
Retailers sold a total of 32 million phones last year, including about 4 million in December, said Denis Kuskov, general director of the Telecomdaily agency. The average retail price of a telephone in 2010 was $145, Kuskov said. Retailers sold a total of $4.64 billion worth of phones last year. In 2009 the average price of a telephone at Yevroset was $157, and 26.2 million sets were sold for $4.1 billion.
Kuskov explained that the average price had fallen because of cheaper smart phones and touchpad devices. Buyers who would have paid $1,000 for an iPhone bought Korean devices with touch screens for $300 to $500. Even the lower priced sets brought sellers 50 percent to 100 percent greater profit than standard mobile phones.
On the high end — $800 and up — Samsung Galaxy S and Wave enjoyed high demand, in addition to the iPhone and HTC Desire, said Eldar Murtazin, chief analyst of the Mobile Research Group. He added that telephones costing less than $33 made up 30 percent of sales.
From www.themoscowtimes.com
