Color-screen handsets will dominate Taiwan's cellphone manufacturing next year, with nearly half of the made-in-Taiwan handsets equipped with color displays, industry pundits said yesterday.
"Color-screen mobile phones are set to be hot globally next year, and local handset manufacturers are going to raise the [color screen handsets] production percentage from less than 3 percent to nearly 50 percent next year," said Wang Ying-yu (王英裕), a telecom industry analyst at Industrial Technology Intelligence Service, a government-funded research center.
Major global cell phone brands like Nokia and Motorola began as early as mid-this year to promote handsets with digital cameras.
But, "These value-added features need color-screen handsets to make them attractive," Wang said.
According to JT Bergqvist, vice president of Nokia, more than 50 percent of Nokia handsets shipped out in 2003 will support multimedia messaging service (MMS). That figure is expected to reach as high as 100 percent in the year 2004.
MMS is a new advanced data transmission mobile service and has evolved from SMS service. MMS allows cellphone users to send text messages as well audio files or color pictures including photos, graphics and animations.
Bergqvist agreed that handsets with these advanced entertainment functions are likely to dominate the mobile market next year
Taiwanese mobile phone makers, known for their sophisticated handset design and production skills, have been producing cellphones for international brands on a contract basis for more than three years.
The nation shipped out 12.9 million handset units in 2001, and that number is estimated to double to more than 27 million in 2002. accounting for 6.8 percent of global handset production, according to the Market Intelligence Center (MIC,
Motorola currently has allocated a portion of its production to BenQ Corp (
Taiwanese makers are expected to see a strong growth in their production this year, shipping out 40.3 million cellphone units, accounting for 8.5 percent global market share, MIC estimates.
However, another analyst expressed skepticism about market acceptance of the color-screen mobile phones.
"Although the production quantity of color-screen handsets will rise in 2003, the market penetration rate won't be good until 2004," said Lin Yu-feng (林育烽), an telecom analyst at MIC.
The limiting factor on the new gadgets will be the increased cost to consumers -- a significant consideration, he said.
"If the price difference between color-screens and traditional black-and-white screen handsets can be less than US$50, demand will grow," Lin added.
Currently the price difference is around US$150.
Lin said that cooperation from phone-service operators is also very important.
"In order to stimulate demand in the local market, phone companies have to offer attractive multimedia services at affordable prices," Lin said.
Currently sending a short text message costs about NT$2.5, while sending a message with a photo costs a much greater amount at around NT$15.
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