Apple's iPhone 5s, 5c take 76% share of Japanese sales in October, including 61% on NTT DoCoMo

Posted:
in iPhone edited January 2014
Apple's new iPhones are big in Japan, taking a 61 percent share of NTT DoCoMo smartphone sales and a 76 percent share of overall sales during the month of October.



The statistics, reported by Kantar World Panel via Twitter, indicate strong demand for the new phones both across Apple's existing carrier partners and the country's largest carrier, one that just began carrying iPhones this season after years of losing subscribers while backing alternative devices from Samsung.

KWP ComTech Japan: #Apple takes 76% share of Japan Smartphone sales during October, including 61% on #NTT DoCoMo

-- KWP ComTech (@KWP_ComTech)


NTT DoCoMo lost 3.2 million users over the past four and a half years as rivals SoftBank (Apple's original partner) and KDDI stole away its customers. Carriers on both sides credited (or blamed) Apple's iPhone for the migration of subscribers.

Intense competition between the three major carriers at the launch of the new iPhone 5s and 5c resulted in blockbuster sales, despite increasingly strident efforts by Samsung to market its phones as serviceable alternatives this summer.

Ginza Apple Store typhoon
Japanese customers brave the wind and rain of a typhoon while lining up to be among the first to purchase an iPhone 5s during the phone's September launch.

Japan never hated the iPhone

Japan's embracing of Apple's latest products comes nearly five years after Wired published an article by Brian X Chen that sought to establish that the Japanese market "hated" the iPhone because Softbank was offering it with promotional pricing.

The piece cited a journalist in Japan as praising the nation's domestic products by local firms such as Panasonic, and attributed to him comments that called the iPhone "an outdated handset compared to Japanese cellphones" and said it would make a person look "pretty lame" to carry one around. "I think most Japanese think iPhone is the coolest item. At least I have and love iPhone," Nobi Hayashi

However, Nobi Hayashi, the journalist cited by Wired, subsequently clarified that he didn't make the comments attributed to him, and actually had explained to Chen that the desired narrative he has selected for the story in advance of writing it was mistaken.

"I think most Japanese think iPhone is the coolest item. At least I have and love iPhone," Hayashi wrote. Wired later issued a correction, after first editing Chen's article multiple times to change the attribution of various quotes. It finally admitted that Chen made up the "pretty lame" quote himself.

Wired wasn't alone in crafting a story about Apple's supposed failure in Japan. Hayashi noted that local newspaper Sankei Shimbun had tipped off reports by publishing an expectation that Softbank would sell one million iPhones during its initial launch period, even though neither Apple nor the carrier had made any prediction of sales.

Yukari Iwatani Kane iPhone


Prior to Chen's article, Yukari Iwatani Kane, writing for the Wall Street Journal, cited numbers from MM Research and quoted an analyst as saying, "the iPhone is a difficult phone to use for the Japanese market because there are so many features it doesn't have."

Kane also discussed lofty sales expectations from unnamed analysts who were said to "widely believe sales are unlikely to reach a total of 500,000 units. That is half the one million units that they previously thought Apple could sell."

Kane even dismissed the iPhone's App Store, writing that it "hasn't taken hold as much in Japan, where consumers tend to be more cautious about making purchases online," but offered no factual basis for that claim. In reality, the App Store has seen tremendous success in Japan from the begining.

The Wall Street Journal report was widely syndicated despite being inaccurate and misleading, and helped to create a longstanding meme that "Japan hates the iPhone," an idea Wired helped to advance for additional months.

By early 2010, MM Research was reporting that Apple was selling 72 percent of all smartphones in Japan.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 43

    I wonder how many people stand out in a hurricane lining up for the latest Samsung phone? Not saying that it's the smartest thing to do though.

  • Reply 2 of 43
    dcgoodcgoo Posts: 280member
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by sog35 View Post

     

    Funny how Apple dominates markets that have alot of money and education?  While Samdung fleeces poor and uneducated markets by bombarding them with endless advertisements and paid shrills.


    ...and that is why brand S is so popular here in .US  <sigh>

  • Reply 3 of 43

    Why aren’t investors calling for inquiries into Android sales/shipments? Why isn’t this happening? We see these numbers. They can’t all add up. Someone has to say something.

  • Reply 4 of 43
    Chen to find new employment at Gizmodo?
  • Reply 5 of 43
    jungmarkjungmark Posts: 6,926member
    Since the 5C is a "failure", we can infer the 5S takes 75% while the 5C takes 1%. Still, combined < 100%. That, my friends, spells doom!!! /s
  • Reply 6 of 43
    When I was stationed in Japan all the US military members and contractors that working on the base pretty much had iPhones. I loved it because it was easy to share info and once iMessage and FaceTime came online things just got better. A lot of Japanese people not associated with the US military also had them more and more. SoftBank was king for having the iPhone. I had an unlimited talk and text plan for $80 dollars. I wish it was that cheap here in the US. I bought my phone outright there and now I do the same here.
  • Reply 7 of 43
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    sog35 wrote: »
    2014 will be the year Samdung will be exposed for what they truly are.  A second rate company that rose to prominence because of copying. 

    You're so sadly mistaken. Samsung didn't pop up overnight, they were a major player in the cell phone business before Apple even thought about making one. Look at the sales numbers, their iPhone clone sold in laughable numbers, but it wasn't until they offered something different from Apple starting with the SGS 3 and an extreme marketing blitz that helped them reach the 'prominence' they have now.
  • Reply 8 of 43
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Tallest Skil View Post

     

    Why aren’t investors calling for inquiries into Android sales/shipments? Why isn’t this happening? We see these numbers. They can’t all add up. Someone has to say something.


    Actually no one has to say anything.  And chances are they probably won't.

  • Reply 9 of 43
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    sog35 wrote: »
    what brand is that? Samsung?

    Apple outsells Samsung 3 to 1 (top end smartphones) in America

    That may be true, but how much does Samsung outsell everyone else? They’re number 2 but how far back is number 3 and 4. They don't have to beat Apple they just have to beat everyone else and they're kicking the snot out of Motorola, HTC, LG, etc....
  • Reply 10 of 43
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    Why aren’t investors calling for inquiries into Android sales/shipments? Why isn’t this happening? We see these numbers. They can’t all add up. Someone has to say something.

    We all see the earning reports every quarter. They might lie about the shipped/sales numbers but they cannot lie about how much money they made. That's what investors seemingly care about. I say seemingly because Amazon continues to lose money and it's stock just continues to rise.
  • Reply 11 of 43
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    sog35 wrote: »
    $900,000,000 disagrees with you.

    Home button - check
    Full touch screen - check
    Pinch to zoom - check

    Its been proven in court that Samdung copied and benefited greatly.

    Look what they have done without copying Apple - Galaxy Gear and Stylus Pens. Pathetic.

    What you listed was not part of the trial, and not what Apple claimed Samsung copied. All the phones have pinch to zoom and that's going to be a hard feature to sue on simply because there's more than one patent. Other manufacturers were already developing touch screen phones when the iPhone came out so it was exactly a innovative novel idea.
  • Reply 12 of 43
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by dasanman69 View Post





    You're so sadly mistaken. Samsung didn't pop up overnight, they were a major player in the cell phone business before Apple even thought about making one. Look at the sales numbers, their iPhone clone sold in laughable numbers, but it wasn't until they offered something different from Apple starting with the SGS 3 and an extreme marketing blitz that helped them reach the 'prominence' they have now.

    Samsung was making Windows Mobile and Symbian phones before the iPhone appeared. It was most famous for its "BlackJack" copy of of the BlackBerry. The company didn’t ever not copy. 

     

    And no, in 2010 the year they cloned the iPhone 3GS, their profits more than doubled, and just kept increasing as they cloned the iPad and every Apple app and the packaging and accessories and retail store designs and ads. Trying to say Samsung developed some original design as the basis for its success just makes you look foolish. 

  • Reply 13 of 43
    Quote:

    Originally Posted by PhilBoogie View Post



    Chen to find new employment at Gizmodo?

    He was at Wired through 2011, then started writing for the (ahem) NY Times.

  • Reply 14 of 43
    Originally Posted by dasanman69 View Post

    They might lie about the shipped/sales numbers but they cannot lie about how much money they made. That's what investors seemingly care about.



    So won’t the investors be complicit in the lies when a government inquiry finds the shipped/sold numbers are an utter fabrication?

  • Reply 15 of 43
    solipsismxsolipsismx Posts: 19,566member
    I wonder how much marketshare NCC DoCoMo lost over the years by not offering the iPhone until now?
  • Reply 16 of 43

    I know it's anecdotal, I asked my 15 year old niece if she sees more iPhones or Androids at her high school? She said, iPhones.

  • Reply 17 of 43
    MacProMacPro Posts: 19,718member
    sog35 wrote: »
    This confirms my belief that Japanese people value honor, craftsmanship, and beauty.   Everything that Apple is and Samdung isn't.  I've never seen a Japanese person sport an ugly 6 inch plastic Samdung POS.

    My Grandmother is 100% Japanese and she would always pay extra to get the better product.  She would rather have nothing than compromise and buy an imitation product.

    Funny how Apple dominates markets that have alot of money and education?  While Samdung fleeces poor and uneducated markets by bombarding them with endless advertisements and paid shrills.

    2014 will be the year Samdung will be exposed for what they truly are.  A second rate company that rose to prominence because of copying. 

    Nicely said.
  • Reply 18 of 43
    dasanman69dasanman69 Posts: 13,002member
    solipsismx wrote: »
    I wonder how much marketshare NCC DoCoMo lost over the years by not offering the iPhone until now?

    Like VZW, they were probably out gaining their losses but it wasn't until this year that they actually started feeling it. It's also most likely why they gave up trying to pre install bloatware.
  • Reply 19 of 43

    "Outch" (Eric Schmidt) 

  • Reply 20 of 43

    Kane ,  Chen,  NYT  WSJ,  et al.    will no doubt repeat their nefarious efforts with rumors of poor iPhone sales ;Chine Mobile.

    Can't wait !  /s

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