Nokia Says Goodbye to JAPAN

Nokia after a few days of speculation finally confirmed that they are leaving Japanese market and will no longer sell any of their devices in Japan. Nokia’s move to quit Japanese market comes out of the current economic downturns and small market share of Nokia in Japanese handset sales.

“In the current global economic climate, we have concluded that the continuation of our investment in Japan-specific product variants is no longer sustainable,” Timo Ihamuotila, executive vice president at Nokia, said in a statement.

Nokia however, will continue to sell the luxury mobile phones brand “Vertu” which Nokia owns. Its global research and development as well as sourcing operations in Japan will also continue. A typical Vertu has an unimaginable price tag of $5,000-$10,000, and it has offered models that ranged up to $310,000. Vertu has decent sales in the Japanese millionaires market.

Another reason speculated in the market about Nokia’s exit is the slow growth opportunities left in the somewhat saturated Japanese market. Over 85% of Japan’s population already owns a handset and the Japanese prefer very high-tech phones from Japanese makers only. Nokia, the biggest handset maker in the world have just 1% market share in Japan.

Nokia aims to focus more on the emerging markets in Asia and Africa where billions of people still do not have mobile phones. “Nokia has bigger opportunities in other markets,” said Carolina Milanesi, an analyst with Gartner Research, “not in a shrinking market like Japan.”

With this news, all the possibilities for Nokia 5800 XpressMusic’s launch in Japan also comes to an end. Bad news for Japanese fans!