06-10-2002, 07:43 AM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,177
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Pocket PCs invade Australia
http://itnews.com.au/story.cfm?ID=10010
Let's kick off this week with a sunshine article! The Australian PDA market was recently analyzed by mobile research specialist Inform, and I found some interesting remarks in an article commenting on the analysis. It seems as if the Australian PDA market is very similar to the Swedish PDA market in that the Pocket PC is overtaking Palm in market share and sales revenue. This has already happened in Sweden, and is happening as we "speak" in Australia.
Palm's market share dipped below 40 percent in April, while HP's Compaq products has grown their share to 33 percent. According to the article the product in demand is the iPAQ 3870 Pocket PC. In April, this bluetooth enabled Pocket PC sold "about double that of the Palm 515."
Finally, it seems that the Australian PDA market has discovered Toshiba too: "Solyom predicted extremely strong sales for Toshiba, which entered the market recently, and will launch a new model - with integrated Bluetooth - that will compete directly with the Ipaq 3870 and the high-end Palm." (Thanks to Mark Hansen for the link!)
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06-10-2002, 10:21 AM
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Sage
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 706
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PDA invasion in Australia
These sorts of stats aren't that surprising. Australia has a very high rate of new technology uptake in general. For example penetration of mobile phones, VCRs and DVD have always been on the leading edge.
WIth regards to the PDA market, I've been a WinCE suer since I got a HP LX320 with CE1.0. SInce then, all of the people I knew with Palms wanted something that did a little more that PIM. Pocket PC has delivered on that. The really surprising thing is that the market penetration of the ipaq and jornada (and now the Toshiba units) is happening with almost no marketing other than in the IT mags (and even then it's pretty limited). If HP, Tosh and the others advertised their products they might generate some real sales. That would help pull the prices down from their current levels (about $AU1200 for an ipaq or approx $US700).
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06-10-2002, 12:02 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 1,177
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I agree that marketing has never seemed to be a priority for the Pocket PC makers. I find it strange that the players in the high end of this market is seen much less in ads/commercials/magazines/airports/hotels etc than the low end player.
I would love to see more Pocket PC marketing, and believe it would make a big difference in terms of sales and market share. My only explanation to why we are not seeing bigger marketing budgets spent is because the market is still regarded as an distinct early-adopter market, ie no volume is yet to be expected. Maybe I am wrong, but if I am not, I still believe that brand value is built over years, not just when you want sales. So regardless of this market being distinct early-adopter or not -- more marketing wanted! 
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06-10-2002, 12:03 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 332
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Who would have thought that we'd be in the news for anything good (if you're not Palm)!
Seems we're always the subject of (deserving) ridicule.
Daniel
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06-10-2002, 12:05 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 332
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They seem to be folloing the "Build it and they will come" method, bit of a shame really.
Although I know that there is a fair bit of negative MS factor involved here. Just lok at the XBox. You should hear the jokes that people make when mt iPAQ crashes!
Daniel
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06-10-2002, 04:22 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 185
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Daniel
Who would have thought that we'd be in the news for anything good (if you're not Palm)!
Seems we're always the subject of (deserving) ridicule.
Daniel |
Nope, mate! Get it right! We are always in the news - for a never-ending yearning & craving :P
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