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3GSM Congress, Cannes 2004. Products from Philips

Contents, all articles from 3GSM Congress

In Cannes Philips was one of the few (another example will most likely be Motorola) who presented biggest amount of new models. This fact is rather unusual by itself, but more unusual statements were made by Ron Dickhoff, CEO of Business unit Wireless, Philips Consumer Electronics. During his speech about company’s new models, he enclosed part of company’s strategy of promoting new models on the market, and described it as detailed as possible. First of all, the company will not try to get bigger market share by any cost, this was noted several times. Company’s aim is playing its role in chosen segments, and not trying to dominate them. Considering that the company’s share on world market is really small, this move looks well-taken. Taking in mind this factor, the company’s second principle will form, Philips plans earning money on their phones. That’s where the decline of producing ultra-cheap phones comes from. Most likely we will not see any Philips products in the budget segment in near future. Such models are required in order to increase market share, but the margin is minimal. Middle price segment will become the main orient for company - here margin on the phones is traditionally high. Another interesting moment is company’s concept on youth segment, main focus for the products will be made exactly on this segment. This means that the company will try to become the strongest player in this field, concentrating on one group of consumers. This decision is really unique; such strategy was not used before. Company’s chances for dominating one segment, instead of trying to perform same action for several segments at once are higher. In my opinion in case if Philips hold to the chosen strategy for about a year or slightly more – we will see the results in form of popularity’s increase among the targeted auditorium.

The company aims for operators, instead of retail sales on European markets. This approach is not really defensible, since dependence from operators have never leaded to anything good; the presence of independent retail channels for products is vital. Recently such move was defensible in order to activate the sales, we will have to analyze how the company will promote itself during some time, and will its tactics be changed.

Let’s move on to the company’s new line-up and finish with overall information. Here is what the company will produce during the next 6 months. The long-known model Philips 639 will be the first in today’s topic. This phone is similar to Philips 530 according to its specifications; however it is presented in 330’s form-factor. This is a cheap clamshell phone, whose external surface is made in form of a mirror. Various case colors are defining mirror’s colors. The phone’s unusual part is that the external display is located under this mirror. The screen is made on OLED technology, but is capable of displaying only 1 color, which may vary depending on case’s colors (yellow or green). The external screen is not always visible when sun is around; you are forced to look for proper angle. On the other hand the display looks rather stunning indoors, its attractive, we didn’t see anything like that in cellular phones before. The user can view various screensavers with sound on the external display. They look rather interesting. Another unusual feature – chronometer, when every 15, 30 or 60 minutes the phone makes a sound, and you will see the corresponding picture on the display. Mirror’s technology used in 639 is called Magic Mirror.

There’s no need to hide the fact that the surface is really easily soiled, a few fingerprints and it will feature fat marks from your hands. This is the reason why velvet duster was included; it can be hung up on your phone’s antenna, this way it will always be at hand. We will not describe the phone's features, you will have the chance to find out more information about them in our review, which will be published in near future. This model will be released in mid. April, the price will be around 260 dollars. This information is not yet final one, company’s representatives pointed out that the price might be even smaller.

Another model was introduced Philips 535, the review of this one has been on our web-site for quite a while now. Its main differences from 530 are built-in VGA camera and the lack of FM radio. Approximately same situation can be seen with more cheap phones, Philips 350 received a pair, and this is Philips 355, which features CIF camera. The model will be released in the end of April, and the price will be around 180-190 dollars. The phone’s functionality is typical for Philips phones, plus the support of Java (MIDP 2.0) was introduced for all phones.

Philips 550/755/759 became actually one and the same phone presented in various designs. The elder model is different from others since it doesn’t have built-in camera, and is dedicated for operators. The rest of functions are equal, they have 7mb of memory spread dynamically among all applications. FotoCall function is present. The most interesting fact is that the screens are capable of displaying up to 65000 colors (128x160 pixels, TFT) and are sensor. These are the first products of such type on the market, sensor screens allow creating hand-written records and send them, by attaching into MMS-messages, or via e-mail. In my opinion this technology will be in demand in those countries, where operator’s services such as MMS are highly developed. On the whole this feature looks curious, but for now it remain niche one, and we can’t really predict its wide spread for now. By the way this technology’s name is “Snap, Tag&Send”. For near future these phones will remain unique on the market, since Philips is the only producer of such displays. The navigation via sensor screens is not so convenient, as with the help of traditional navigational keys. The screens in the prototypes that were presented to us reacted with some amount of delay, but the representatives noted that these are the prototypes, and these problems will be fixed. We will have to wait until summer in order to see retail samples. The phones will cost around 275 dollars, and will most likely be released in July.

Model Philips 855 is one of the first clamshell phones that can open up to 180 degrees. About a year ago Sagem was planning to release X8, a model with similar specifications, but was unable to solve technical problems related to sliding contacts in the clamshell’s alignment. However Philips managed to solve this question. Besides not really usual type of opening the phone has two color screens to offer (external STN one – 4096 colors and internal TFT, 128x160 pixels), 9 mb of memory, built-in VGA-camera and 32-tone polyphonic ring tones (by the way this parameter is identical for all phones from the new line-up). Additional adapter TV-Link will be released for this model, with its help you will have the ability to show the pictures made with your phone on the TV. Such function wasn’t presented by any manufacturer on European market yet, although it exists in Japan and South Korea. The phone fits nicely into ones palm, the external screen supports FotoCall function, and this means that the incoming call will be provided with caller’s picture. This model will be released in July; its approximate price will be 300-320 dollars.