Nokia is preparing to roll out its first GPRS handset in volume, following a low-key launch.
Nokia has finally released the 8310, its first GPRS phone. The Finnish company just made its scheduled release date of Q3 2001, shipping a very small number of handsets to the Finnish mobile retailer, Makitorppa, on the last working day of the quarter. At the time of the initial release, volume production was expected to commence in the following weeks.
European mobile players had been hoping the launch of GPRS (general packet radio service), a 2.5G network technology, would drive growth in the slowing mobile market. But although GPRS has now been introduced across Europe, it has not yet taken off. Datamonitor expects less than two million GPRS handsets will be sold in Europe this year.
The 8310’s late launch may have held the overall market back. Nokia has the largest market share and strongest customer loyalty in the handset market – both because of the brand’s perceived quality and image, and because consumers have become accustomed to the user interface that Nokia handsets share.
But while the 8310 will doubtless be a success, it may not set the world on fire. For a start, GPRS’ speed for the moment looks likely to stay at around 28.8kbits/s – a respectable improvement over the 9.6kbit/s offered by GSM, but still slower than expected. More important, though, is GPRS’ ‘always on’ capability, meaning that data services are available at all times.
‘Always on’ has caused headaches for operators in pricing the service. The most common option seems to be making users pay per megabyte transmitted. However, some operators have opted for a time-based pricing model. No operator has yet announced a flat rate tariff, which would enable unlimited data transfer for a single monthly fee, which would clearly be a highly attractive proposition for many end-users.
As the new products and services begin to be picked up by end-users, GPRS will begin to gain acceptance in the market, with around 27 million GPRS handsets sold next year. However, it will be 2004 before GPRS handset shipments exceed those of GSM units.
