Daniel Eran Dilger
Just over two months after Apple launched its new iPhone 5s and 5c across Japan's three major carriers, weekly sales rankings list various iPhone models split between the carriers took 9 of the top 10 smartphone slots.
Weekly sales rankings by Japan's BCN list Softbank's 32GB iPhone 5s as the nation's the top seller, with the same model on NTT DoCoMo and au/KDDI filling out the top three.
iPhone 5c on Softbank and au took the fifth and sixth spots, while the second place DoCoMo phone was the high end 64GB iPhone 5s.
The top selling smartphone not from Apple wasn't a domestic branded smartphone or a Samsung model but rather a low end Chinese device by ZTE.
Sony represented two models in the top 20, while the top selling Samsung device was a Galaxy S4 at 16th, behind two additional iPhone models: 64GB versions of iPhone 5s on au and NTT DoCoMo. In total, Apple took 12 of the top 20 slots compared to just one Samsung device.
NTT DoCoMo pulls a Verizon
Prior to launching iPhone 5s and 5c in September, NTT DoCoMo had been pushing Android phones from Sony and Samsung in an effort to resist Apple's refusal to allow preinstalled apps or carrier branding on its iPhones.
Two years ago, Chief Executive Ryuji Yamada defended his refusal to carry iPhones using the same logic Wired presented two years before that: the lack of built in support for popular features like iMode messaging and digital wallet systems.
After losing 3.2 million users over the last 4 and a half years by not carrying the iPhone, NTT DoCoMo finally relented and began carrying Apple's smartphone this fall.
The majority of the carrier's sales immediately went to iPhones, mirroring a virtually identical story at Verizon Wireless in the U.S.
Verizon spent two years backing BlackBerry's attempts to provide an iPhone-alternative with two failed generations of the Storm, then orchestrated an intense effort to position Android as its "Droid" branded alternative to iPhone in 2010.
Despite offering 4G LTE service, Verizon's Droid program failed to attract the high value data subscribers AT&T was attracting with iPhones. After launching iPhone 4 in 2011, Verizon reported the 3G model outselling all of its Android 4G sales combined.
Japan doesn't love Samsung
Just as Motorola had partnered with Verizon in 2010 in an attempt to gain a footing on a carrier without iPhones, Samsung had attempted to partner with NTT DoCoMo to "improve its brand image in Japan," stated Sumio Hiroshi, a manager at Canon in Japan.
While special incentives and promotions helped Samsung to push volume smartphone sales on NTT DoCoMo this summer, just as Motorola had apparent success in selling phones on Verizon in 2010, its popularity was short lived when it was exposed to competition from Apple's iPhone.
Complicating Samsung's efforts to sell phones to Japan is an unfavorable view of South Korea related to a territorial dispute over islands located between the two nations, a squabble that has been escalating for years.
In 2011, Japan's foreign ministry instructed its staffers not fly with Korean Air. The two countries have long maintained a rivalry. In stark contrast, modern Japan has long viewed America more favorably, with a particular affinity for Apple and in particular Steve Jobs.
William Gallagher
Christine McKee
AppleInsider Staff
Chip Loder
Malcolm Owen
37 Comments
So Apple was right about the 5c after all?
[quote name="Quadra 610" url="/t/160981/apples-iphone-5s-5c-take-9-of-japans-top-10-smartphone-sales-spots#post_2441766"]So Apple was right about the 5c after all? [/quote] Apple doesn't get everything right, but they do get many things right. I'm not surprised at all.
If I'm looking at this right, the 32 gb models are more popular than the 16 gb models.
So Apple is selling likely more than 15x phones than Samsung and despite that, Android is outselling IOS 4 to 1 ? If there was a need to get a proof that all numbers about android are totally bullshit, this is it. When you rank at the 9 first places of sales you are, with the usual distribution of numbers ,getting at least 80% of the market, I would say. This is only Japan of course, and all markets are different, but this is a quite big one. Now, average ASP will be a thing to look after. It is quite unusual for a company bestseller to be the top of range, and here we have both the 32 & 64 versions of the 5s doing really well !
So Apple is selling likely more than 15x phones than Samsung and despite that, Android is outselling IOS 4 to 1 ?
If there was a need to get a proof that all numbers about android are totally bullshit, this is it. When you rank at the 9 first places of sales you are, with the usual distribution of numbers ,getting at least 80% of the market, I would say.
This is only Japan of course, and all markets are different, but this is a quite big one.
Now, average ASP will be a thing to look after. It is quite unusual for a company bestseller to be the top of range, and here we have both the 32 & 64 versions of the 5s doing really well !
If you take the sum of all Androids all over the world vs the iPhone, then yes Android is outselling the iPhone, however Apple does not compete at the very low end and it does not compete world wide either. The China Mobile deal is about to be closed and yes, they will increase their share of that market. However think of some other big markets where they are absent. India, Africa, South America. When that starts happening watch for more growth. I don't expect iOS to overtake Android in the overall market but I do expect them to dominate in the high end market and definitely in the profit-share and usage markets.