Nokia plans to roll out cheaper 3G handset models

Nokia Oyj, the world's top mobile phone vendor, aims to promote next-generation handsets to local users by introducing more lower-priced models with improved designs later this year, a company official said yesterday.

Nokia's remarks come amid criticism by Taiwanese mobile operators, who have blamed high price tags and bulkiness of 3G handsets, along with limited choices of models, for the lukewarm adoption of 3G services since their debut in the middle of last year.

"Those premiums [on handset prices] will disappear this year," Loren Shuster, general manager of Nokia's Taiwan branch, said yesterday during a luncheon with reporters.

In the second half of this year, Nokia plans to offer local consumers several different 3G handsets, including entry-level models that offer basic functions and affordable prices, Shuster said.

He said that 3G phones would account for half of Nokia's product portfolio for this year. The Finnish handset maker plans to launch at least 50 new models this year, Shuster said.

This would mark a huge jump from the four models Nokia launched in Taiwan last year.

"We hope to push the 3G mobile phones into the mass market," Shuster said.

The Nokia official said the domestic 3G market would be successful if the number of users rises to account for 15 percent of total mobile subscribers this year.

If plans by Nokia and its peers to roll out cheaper 3G handsets are fulfilled, Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), the nation's top phone company, said earlier this year that its 3G subscribers would jump to 1 million by the end of this year from around 250,000 users now.

Despite the transition from 2G to 3G era, domestic handset sales will remain steady or register mild growth this year, Shuster said, without giving any reasons.

Handset unit sales are expected to post 4 percent growth to 6.9 million units this year from last year, given a lack of catalysts in the domestic market, which is becoming saturated, according to a forecast by the Taipei-based market researcher Market Intelligence Center (市場情報中心).

Sales are expected to grow 4 percent annually as well, to NT$45.36 billion (US$1.4 billion) this year, compared with NT$43.63 billion last year, the researcher projected.