3 ms·

One reason is that the price dropped quite a bit. I got a 8GB for "free" last year, subject to a 2 year contract. Your estimate of 20~40% is probably off by a

by nandemo 16y ago

One reason is that the price dropped quite a bit. I got a 8GB for "free" last year, subject to a 2 year contract. Your estimate of 20~40% is probably off by a factor of about 10, though. Think about it. Softbank is one of the 3 major mobile carriers in Japan. In fact, the other two are still bigger. Even all of the dozens of Softbank models combined probably don't add up to 25% of market share. Also, each carrier has had their own app stores way before iPhone existed. Of course, iPhone has the novelty factor, a great interface, etc, but existing stores have plenty of apps and also a subscription model.

shashashasha 16y ago
"of the people visibly using a cell phone, 20% to 40% of them had an iPhone" i imagine the visibly using a cellphone is the key part, as i'm sure most people on bart have cellphones but the only ones people play with on the subway have either an iphone or android phone. same case w/ iphone market share vs iphone mobile browser usage share.
fookyong 16y ago
I think that cities are vastly biased towards the iPhone. There's just lots of pro-iPhone people in the cities; mac users (note there are only a few mac stores in Japan and they are all in big cities), Japanese people who are more "worldly", business people or tech people who appreciate the easy access to the real web and not watered down iMode version etc etc. But get outside the cities - you know, the other 90% of Japan - and I'd wager a guess that the amount of iPhones you see in the wild drops considerably. So you're right in a way. There's probably very high market penetration within big cities. But outside the cities where its high school kids, X-corp salarymen, factory workers and housewives, other models dominate.
- gjm11 16y ago
  > outside the cities - you know, the other 90% of Japan So far as I can tell, more than half the population of Japan is in major metropolitan areas.

by nandemo 16y ago

shashashasha 16y ago

"of the people visibly using a cell phone, 20% to 40% of them had an iPhone" i imagine the visibly using a cellphone is the key part, as i'm sure most people on bart have cellphones but the only ones people play with on the subway have either an iphone or android phone. same case w/ iphone market share vs iphone mobile browser usage share.

fookyong 16y ago

I think that cities are vastly biased towards the iPhone. There's just lots of pro-iPhone people in the cities; mac users (note there are only a few mac stores in Japan and they are all in big cities), Japanese people who are more "worldly", business people or tech people who appreciate the easy access to the real web and not watered down iMode version etc etc. But get outside the cities - you know, the other 90% of Japan - and I'd wager a guess that the amount of iPhones you see in the wild drops considerably. So you're right in a way. There's probably very high market penetration within big cities. But outside the cities where its high school kids, X-corp salarymen, factory workers and housewives, other models dominate.

gjm11 16y ago
> outside the cities - you know, the other 90% of Japan So far as I can tell, more than half the population of Japan is in major metropolitan areas.