Apple has been slowly stealing Nokia’s market share since the release of the iPhone, but this past quarter it finally passed the Finnish handset manufacturer. By a mile. Well, half a billion dollars actually, but that’s not how the saying goes.
At first glance it might not seem like terrible news for Nokia. According to research firm Strategy Analytics the company still leads in overall handset share, shipping over 108 million handsets in the third quarter (compared to 7.4 million iPhones). But that actually makes the news worse. Nokia is selling more phones – nearly 15 times as many – but losing in profits by 50% of what the company earned? That’s insane, and it’s a trend that will likely continue. Apple has put the iPhone on multiple carriers overseas to great success, something we’ll likely see stateside in the near future.
The Strategy Analytics report points to several factors for Apple’s success, high subsidies and low manufacturing costs among them. There’s no reason those things should change for Apple anytime soon. Enough people want the iPhone that carriers would be crazy to boycott the phone based on the price. It’s a problem that points back to branding. If you asked a hundred people what an iPhone is I’d guess 85 or more could tell you, most in great detail. Ask about an N97 and you might get 10. 15 tops. How long before the same can be said for Nokia itself?
