Entelligence: What's the future of Nokia?
By Michael Gartenberg 
posted December 1st 2009 5:46PM
posted December 1st 2009 5:46PM
Entelligence is a column by technology strategist and author Michael Gartenberg, a man whose desire for a delicious cup of coffee and a quality New York bagel is dwarfed only by his passion for tech. In these articles, he'll explore where our industry is and where it's going -- on both micro and macro levels -- with the unique wit and insight only he can provide.
It's the largest cell phone maker in the world, with the largest share of any smartphone vendor in the world. Yet I increasingly look at Nokia's products and listen to its strategy wondering if the company can remain relevant in a mobile world that's changed drastically over the last two years. I'm not talking about a Nokia deathwatch, or whether the company will remain in business -- that's foolish. Of course Nokia is going to stick around; it's what it's going to look like that concerns me. A future of selling low-end phones into emerging markets with some minor services might be profitable, but it's not a direction that leads to industry relevance or influence.
First, I'm confused by Nokia's platform strategy. There's been a lot of chatter about Maemo being the future, and while it might be a strategic direction, it's nowhere near ready for primetime now. Chris Ziegler suggested to me the other day that "Maemo 6 (or 7) in an X6 form factor with a more cohesive Ovi strategy could be killer." Perhaps, but right now Maemo feels very immature and unfinished. In fact, it feels like what it is: an OS designed for Nokia's Internet Tablet MIDs. On a phone like the N900 it's just too kludgey for the mainstream market. That leaves Symbian-based S60, which was totally innovative in 2002 but now looks creaky and has fragmented into multiple versions, leaving a very confused developer market. Sure, Nokia supports Flash and Silverlight with Qt somehow tying all this diversity into some unified grand theory, but it's enough complexity to make most developers look elsewhere -- and that's exactly what's happened. Without a clear platform strategy, it's going to be difficult for Nokia to get the developer mindshare required to stay relevant to the mass market.
Second, Nokia's services strategy is as muddled as the fruit in Don Draper's Old Fashioned. Ovi sounded good when it was announced but it's now gone through so many iterations, with different services added, dropped, and changed that it's hard to know what's in and what's out. Comes With Music has been reported as having as few as 107,000 users worldwide, and Nokia's put off bringing it to the US this year, leading me to wonder what kind of future it has as a service. The N-Gage project not only resulted in two failed phone designs but the service itself is on its deathbed.
Third, Nokia's most recent hardware designs are baffling. Nokia's had some great phones. The 8860 defined fashion and technology in its time, the Matrix-inspired Nokia 7710 was the first phone with a WAP browser, and the N95 was a marvel of technology. Recent designs, however, have been a strange mix of checklist features that simply add up to a poor user experience. Last year's N97 flagship was an exercise in how not to create a touchscreen phone, complete with an odd three row keyboard
featuring a space bar mysteriously moved right of center. The N900 feels more like a science experiment to me than a product that's designed for mainstream users -- although, to be fair, Nokia does position it as an enthusiast device. I used to feel Nokia's hardware designs defined cool, but these days they just remind me of an aging movie starlet trying to re-capture some former beauty.
Finally, Nokia's greatly in decline in the US / North American market and in dire need of a successful product strategy and launch. With no US carriers supporting its flagship and most profitable devices, Nokia's share in the US is in huge decline, and only the most devout users are willing to pay over $500 for unlocked devices to use on T-Mobile or AT&T. There's more to the world than the US and North America, but if you're going to remain cutting-edge and relevant it's not a market that can be ignored.
Tossing around ideas about this column on gdgt last week, my good friend Peter Rojas said, "Nokia has a classic innovator's dilemma: they're so big and (at least to-date) have been so dominant that it's been hard for them to create innovative new products which might cannibalize their existing product lines." I think it's more than that. Nokia failed to lead a changed market and has been forced into reacting to competitors instead of driving its own vision of the future. As smartphones left the realm of the enthusiast and became mass-market in terms of adoption and feature use, Nokia fell behind.
Now, I don't think that's fatal or long term, and I don't believe Nokia is going out of business. But I do question the company's position in the market and ability to lead without a major change in direction and strategy -- especially in the US and North America. Truth be told, Nokia now reminds me a lot of Apple back in 1996, losing relevance and market share in places that matter but with huge potential to leverage core assets and a terrific brand with millions of loyal fans. And as Apple did in its day, Nokia must now either try to decisively seize back its leadership position -- or lose it entirely.
Michael Gartenberg is vice president of strategy and analysis at Interpret, LLC. His weblog can be found at gartenblog.net. Contact him at gartenberg AT gmail DOT com. Views expressed here are his own.
First, I'm confused by Nokia's platform strategy. There's been a lot of chatter about Maemo being the future, and while it might be a strategic direction, it's nowhere near ready for primetime now. Chris Ziegler suggested to me the other day that "Maemo 6 (or 7) in an X6 form factor with a more cohesive Ovi strategy could be killer." Perhaps, but right now Maemo feels very immature and unfinished. In fact, it feels like what it is: an OS designed for Nokia's Internet Tablet MIDs. On a phone like the N900 it's just too kludgey for the mainstream market. That leaves Symbian-based S60, which was totally innovative in 2002 but now looks creaky and has fragmented into multiple versions, leaving a very confused developer market. Sure, Nokia supports Flash and Silverlight with Qt somehow tying all this diversity into some unified grand theory, but it's enough complexity to make most developers look elsewhere -- and that's exactly what's happened. Without a clear platform strategy, it's going to be difficult for Nokia to get the developer mindshare required to stay relevant to the mass market.
Second, Nokia's services strategy is as muddled as the fruit in Don Draper's Old Fashioned. Ovi sounded good when it was announced but it's now gone through so many iterations, with different services added, dropped, and changed that it's hard to know what's in and what's out. Comes With Music has been reported as having as few as 107,000 users worldwide, and Nokia's put off bringing it to the US this year, leading me to wonder what kind of future it has as a service. The N-Gage project not only resulted in two failed phone designs but the service itself is on its deathbed.
Third, Nokia's most recent hardware designs are baffling. Nokia's had some great phones. The 8860 defined fashion and technology in its time, the Matrix-inspired Nokia 7710 was the first phone with a WAP browser, and the N95 was a marvel of technology. Recent designs, however, have been a strange mix of checklist features that simply add up to a poor user experience. Last year's N97 flagship was an exercise in how not to create a touchscreen phone, complete with an odd three row keyboard
Nokia failed to lead a changed market and has been forced into reacting to competitors instead of driving its own vision of the future. |
Finally, Nokia's greatly in decline in the US / North American market and in dire need of a successful product strategy and launch. With no US carriers supporting its flagship and most profitable devices, Nokia's share in the US is in huge decline, and only the most devout users are willing to pay over $500 for unlocked devices to use on T-Mobile or AT&T. There's more to the world than the US and North America, but if you're going to remain cutting-edge and relevant it's not a market that can be ignored.
Tossing around ideas about this column on gdgt last week, my good friend Peter Rojas said, "Nokia has a classic innovator's dilemma: they're so big and (at least to-date) have been so dominant that it's been hard for them to create innovative new products which might cannibalize their existing product lines." I think it's more than that. Nokia failed to lead a changed market and has been forced into reacting to competitors instead of driving its own vision of the future. As smartphones left the realm of the enthusiast and became mass-market in terms of adoption and feature use, Nokia fell behind.
Now, I don't think that's fatal or long term, and I don't believe Nokia is going out of business. But I do question the company's position in the market and ability to lead without a major change in direction and strategy -- especially in the US and North America. Truth be told, Nokia now reminds me a lot of Apple back in 1996, losing relevance and market share in places that matter but with huge potential to leverage core assets and a terrific brand with millions of loyal fans. And as Apple did in its day, Nokia must now either try to decisively seize back its leadership position -- or lose it entirely.
Michael Gartenberg is vice president of strategy and analysis at Interpret, LLC. His weblog can be found at gartenblog.net. Contact him at gartenberg AT gmail DOT com. Views expressed here are his own.
"A future of selling low-end phones into emerging markets with some minor services might be profitable"
It will most definitely profitable.
You only have to look at China. No one can afford an official iPhone so you get plenty of KIRFs. Where as Nokia with their extensive catalogue from cheap to high end phones covers all possible markets. Someones first phone in China could possible be a nokia, and since you are more likely going to continue on buying a brand you are used to, they'll replace their phone with another nokia.
@SamUK
Too simplistic and flawed. Selling millions of phones does not make one profitable. Sure, Apple has sold millions but they have TONS of profits beyond the manufacturing costs. It's all about margin and there is little margin when you're selling cheap.
The whole argument about buying brands your safe is true but not true 100% of the time. I think my first phone was a Nokia, one of those free ones with a one year contract. I think my second was a Samaung, and now the iPhone. Nokia prides itself in selling the higher end phones in the USA (the market this article was written towards.) And during times when they need to innovate to stay ahead these days and don't, it's hard to keep customers due to brand loyalty.
@SamUK
do you have any idea of how many Nokia Kirfs are sold in China?
@SamUK @SamUK
You know how many iphones r sold in China? MILLIONS, and Apple just signed a 5 million exclusive deal with one of the major telcos in China (unbundled unlike the rest of the world are getting). Just because most KIRFs are manufactured there doesnt mean they cant afford iphones.
And I wouldnt call US market a high end market as well JP cellphone makers have been putting cutting edge technologies into their cellphones for ages. things you probably have never heard of and will not for the next 2-3 years
@SamUK
Nokia has got 2 bullets in the head since Apple and Blackberry launched their High end devices. Knowing that the prices of these devices are going to decrease gradually will complicate Nokia's situation. Moreover, If Apple and Blackberry invade what so called the low end Cellphone industry, Nokia will be burried immediatelly due to the fact that it has nomore competitve edge, except pricing .
@SamUK
What about the future of Nokla then?
@SamUK Dude ... You know nothing about China.Chinese are RICH, very very RICH.
I think it's funny, as with iPhone we think that Nokia is doomed.
Nokia's fine. At least overseas.
@mikmik111
Everyone's been wondering what's the future of Nokia and talks of doomed ever since they stepped out of the limelight. But can't they just be fine.
@mikmik111
Totally agree with you. I just came back from Asia. Nokia is doing pretty well in countries like Thailand, Singapore, Hong Kong and China. Those Nokia phones are not KIRF Nokia's either, they're real Nokia phones. You also can see Nokia stores in pretty much every shopping malls there.
@mikmik111
Does the N900 have MMS yet?
@mikmik111
Agreed.
Michael, and Engadget in general, doesn't realise that there's 300 million people in the US and over 2 billion people in India and China. Now guess which market is more important to Nokia? The iPhone has bombed in both Asian countries.
@xbit
Profit margins matter much more than the size of the audience.
Theoretically, if Apple is making $100 per phone in the US and Nokia is making $10 per phone in Asia, Apple is going to be more profitable.
That isn't to say that the smartphone market here in the US is as big as the dumbphone market in Asia. I'm just making up numbers to emphasize the importance of profit margin in our calculations.
Just because Nokia sells more phones doesn't mean they are making more money.
Nokia is doomed for an M&A deal. Microsoft? Dell? Anyone?
I live in Indonesia, it's one of the largest markets for Nokia. In the old days Nokia had near monopoly in Indonesia, no other mobile phone brand mattered. Now, favorite mobile phone in Indonesia is ... Blackberry. All teenagers want to have Blackberry, not Nokia. I asked mobile phone seller who sells both Blackberry and Nokia what people buy, he told me out of 10 phones, 8 Blackberry, 2 Nokia. Even worse for Nokia is the fact that, secondhand mobile phone dealers are full of Nokia mobile phones these days as people want to get rid of Nokia and switch to Blackberry, iPhone or HTC. N97 is such a junk that even second hand shops don't want to buy it anymore - they have full stock of it and nobody wants to buy it.
The perception now is that Nokia is a junk mobile phone for poor people. People with cash buy Blackberry, iPhone or HTC and there's no surprise here, Nokia used to be the best, now they produce only junk. There's absolutely no innovation in their products. Using Nokia here is now even unfashionable.
Considering that they've lost Indonesia - one of the largest markets for mobile phone manufacturers - I see completely no future for this company. I even predict that in 3 years they'll be going bankrupt. Just look at their financial reports, sales going down everywhere.
20% sales drop Q3/2009 vs Q3/2008, 9.2% sales drop in APAC Q3/2009 vs Q3/2008, is this what you call doing "fine"? You'll sales figures for Q4, in my opinion at least 15% sales drop in APAC vs Q4/2008. They should be already planning who to sell this business.
@asiantraveler
Bullshit. From Canlsys:
http://www.canalys.com/pr/2009/r2009112.htm
"Nokia remains the smart phone volume leader by some distance and its share is stable year on year. In Q3 it suffered somewhat from component shortages as suppliers reduced capacity due to the overall market slowdown, but while its smart phone volume was down 10% in EMEA year on year, in the APAC region 29% growth put it comfortably ahead of the market average."
So where are your stats? Other than your ass?
MarkAnderson, few quotes from Nokia's Q3'09 Interim Report:
http://investors.nokia.com/phoenix.zhtml?c=107224&p=irol-newquarterlyearnings
"At constant currency, Devices & Services net sales would have decreased 20%. The net sales decline resulted primarily from lower volumes, combined with the ASP decline, compared with the third quarter 2008."
"Nokia’s share of the converged mobile device market was an estimated 35% in the third quarter 2009, at the same level as in the third quarter 2008 and down from 41% in the second quarter 2009."
"Our year on year market share was higher in Europe, Latin America and Middle East & Africa. This was offset by lower market share in Greater China, Asia-Pacific and North America. Sequentially, our market share declined in Greater China, Asia- Pacific, Middle East & Africa and North America, but was offset by our increased market share in Europe and Latin America."
@asiantraveler
Uh... that refers to all sales, not converged devices (smartphones) which are up. Try again.
More US centric nonsense.
@(Unverified)
Well said.
@(Unverified)
Is Nokia's flagship phones sucking a symptom unique to the US?
@(Unverified)
Nonsense? I think it was very well written and I agree with pretty much everything. And I'm in Europe, using a Nokia, too. Nokia is behind in some aspects, and having a more unified platform is much needed for them to compete in the smartphone market.
That being said, the US is a weird market, where phones get released by carriers, not phone manufacturers. And if you want to use a certain phone you're pretty much forced to use a certain carrier and its rules and limitations...
Perhaps Nokia doesn't want to play these games and that's why it's not as popular (subsidized) in the US. Maybe this was not emphasized enough in the article, but nevertheless it's a well written piece.
@(Unverified)
Agreed
@(Unverified) more chubby fingered US centric nonsense.
@(Unverified)
Yup, Nokia's dominant in almost every country except the US. In my opinion, Nokia being unsuccessful in the US does not mean that they are not being innovative. They might lack a little for the most users here on Engadget, but for the business and common user they're great. Easy to use, straightforward, things that are important in today's market. My mom and dad for example are simply never going to be able to understand a WinMo or Blackberry device, hence they're using Nokia phones. People often forget that more (features in this case) is not always better. Keeping it simple is the way to go to address the largest amount of users, and Nokia's doing exactly that.
I do agree!
I've been a longtime fan of Nokia (1st Nokia phone - N95 original UK version costing $700). Had the N95 for 2 years, before I went to the 5800, E71 and N97. While the 5800 and E71 weren't the horror that the N97 was, they were still not upto par with their competitors.
It's such a shame to see my favorite cell company go down. But they are just not innovating enough.
The ONLY product from Nokia which makes me give up the 3GS is their N900. Which again does not have AT&T 3G band.
They should lead the markets again with Quadband GSM & 3G. That'd be tight!
Ohh, and more capacitive screen devices. With fluid UI, their 5mpx camera with flash and a revamped Symbian OS...it would be a winner!
"Something in human nature causes us to start slacking off at our moment of greatest accomplishment. As you become successful, you will need a great deal of self-discipline not to lose your sense of balance, humility, and commitment."
That explains what happens to companies when they become too big and begin resting on their laurels. Microsoft did it and gave *Unix a chance to creep up on it, Intel did it before when AMD was mopping the floor with pentiums clock for clock, and Nokia is not exempt from this weakness. The beauty of competition is that it gives companies a wake up call when they are fucking up.
If anybody at Nokia HQ is reading this: Quit rehashing the N95 in different form factors + this or - that. We are done with your 2 year old 5 mpx Carl Zeis lens, slider phones, and comparatively weak CPU's: its time to get with the program. I saw the old Omnia i900 play PSX @ 60fps with Winmo.
Simplify your services and product line and innovate more. We want an all in one device that means OLED, Xenon Flash, 5+ mpx cam, Divx, HDMI or display port out, native SIP, printing a la E71, IR, CPU that isn't weaker than the competition's, hardware video acceleration, and 3.8"+ display, Physical slide out or detachable magnetic Bluetooth keyboards with good tactile feedback so my thumbs wont kill me after 20 min of typing like the N97 did. Space bar goes in the MIDDLE, keys should be a little separated and 4 rows. + Maemo 6 plz.
I could care less about an app store but mainstream ppl do so get that OVI stuff and all the services together into one site (including grape vine and sports tracker). DO some good marketing showing how much money ppl can save dropping all that cash on your "flagship" phone against paying extra for Nike sports tracker for iphone, saving $ by making SIP calls, not paying extra monthly for GPS, not paying extra for accessories like fm transmitter and gps docks and buying apps on iPhones for stuff that is already built into your phones. You have all the cards nobody else has: You make your own *quality tested* hardware, make your own "open" software, own your own services, have full blown linux. Maemo supports Python programming for god's sake! Better than Java (Android) in my humble opinion. There should be no reason why you are losing market share!
I'm going to stop there before I write a book but I will gladly continue if you pay me.
K Thx Bye
PS: Your phones are not that hard to use but they should have 2 usage modes that changes the entire UI: A dumb one for regular folks and an advanced one for power users.
Hm, fair enough.
Sweet article. Now can you guys PLEASE change the body font back to a sans seriff? fo the love of god, i find it very hard to read engadget vista's articles now. on a 24" screen like i have it is painful to say the least.
oh, and yeah, your right on that nokia stuff. only thing left for them is to follw, the chance the lead is long gone. as long as the make stuff people care about, fine. but they sure as heck wont crack the american market at all.
@king_electric_warmonger
Why don't you just use the stylish addon for FF https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/2108 and use this style http://userstyles.org/styles/22701 to fix it; or make your own. It fixes the font issue, and removes some of the crap from the homepage.
@king_electric_warmonger
I totally agree. Learn the difference between internet and print, Engadget! Serif fonts are a bitch to read on a computer screen.
And no, I'm not going to switch to Firefox and install some crazy add-in to fix Engadget's fonts.
@MJGAMER 1991 XBL
Thank you so much!
My eyes no longer feel like they are trying to look at the sun through a telescope!
@king_electric_warmonger Make your own .css, or read engadget via rss.
I really hope Nokia comes up with something GOOD for 2010...
This was a good read, and I'm glad there's someone at Engadget HQ that's capable of writing about Nokia without resorting to flame-baits and trolling.
"There's more to the world than the US and North America, but if you're going to remain cutting-edge and relevant it's not a market that can be ignored."
The largest problem here is probably the carriers themselves. All operating on different technologies/frequencies, it's at odds with the rest of the world. And when partnering up with a carrier, they call the shots, making both software and hardware decicions. In a lot of Nokia's other markets, carriers are just someone that meters the usage between the callers, and that's it. They're just an information highway.
You don't see Dell or HP designing laptops with features taken out for use with specific ISP's, because these ISP's use some magical different TCP/IP than the rest of the world.
So yes, it's a possible problem for Nokia that they don't have dominance in the US, but it's not really Nokia that is to blame for not rolling over to the demands of a draconian carrier business that is as far from supply and demand and fair competition as is possible.
@Sarig
Great point!
@Sarig
True, Nokia isn't used to dealing with carriers as partners. They should rethink that for the US market, as the US market isn't the same environment as their native European market.
@Sarig
With them not having a large foot-hold in the US, considering how different the market is and all, it might simply not be cost-effective to develop/change handsets for the US market, when they might not be a huge success.
So maybe Nokia is just willing to say f*ck it, and have the rest of the world instead :)
@Sarig
Very well put. Just as you don't buy your customized PC from the ISP you shouldn't be forced to buy your phone from the carrier.
Although, in Europe we mostly buy subsidized phones as well, but at least we're mostly free to buy the same phone from various carriers and use its functions without limitations. I switched 3 carriers in the last 2 years, just because they came up with better plans, and I never had to worry about phone compatibility..
@rjzak
i think the US carriers should rethink their role in all of this, i'm sure that if one of them stopped being such an arse and changed into a dumb information conduit, all others would be forced to follow.
because i personally can't imagine anybody stupid enough to stay with a typical US carrier if there was any alternative. they should just stay out of firmwares and stop offering their extra services that nobody needs.
here (in an obscure part of europe) the mobile service providers are just there to make it possible for you to use your phone, you just sign a contract and pay your monthly bills and that's all, you never hear from them again, there is no sign of a "customized" firmware in my phone and if i wanted i could get another provider's SIM card today and start using it with my phone (all of them even use the same frequencies). That would be none of my original provider's business as long as i paid what i signed the contract for.
@(Unverified) The carriers are too greedy let go of the goodies. And all carriers would have to step away from the custom firmware, locking, etc, or else the new trend wouldn't stick.
How obscure of a part of Europe? Moldova? Transnistria?
@Sarig That is an excellent, concisely-put point.
@rjzak, in my case Serbia. While providers do offer subsidized phones, they lock you with a contract, not with the device. Some do add applications to the phones they sell (which you can just uninstall, or in the worst case just reflash your device), but no firmware modifications, SIM locking and other shit. There are only couple of companies in Europe that actually do that, but people tend to avoid them and just purchase their device directly from the manufacturer. The whole subsidizing thing never took off in a big way in Europe and cellular providers are quite comparable to ISPs. Not to mention that, with a few minor exceptions, the whole Europe (and most of Asia and Africa) use the same frequencies so you need not to worry will your 3G or even voice work on some other provider. In that sense, Europe has always been ahead of the US. And it doesn't come as surprise that Nokia in all honesty doesn't care much about the US market - I guess that they figured out that it's more trouble than it's worth. Tho, with recent developments and US catching up with the rest of the world when it comes to cellular networks, I don't think they can afford to ignore US market anymore.
@rjzak
Slovenia
on an unrelated note: what do i need to do to make my real nickname show up instead of "(Unverified)"?
@Sarig F*ck the US market. Agreeing to draconian rules of the US carriers that are designed to squeeze every penny out of the customers and lock them in for life? Agreeing to fully give over the control over the software on your phones? Agreeing to disable features because the carrier said so?
Why would Nokia ever want to do that???
And even supporting the weird US frequencies and mobile standards is ... not worth the small market. Really, get on with the times and use GSM and proper 3G like the rest of the world.
I don't know how locked in users are in the US, but here in EU everyone realizes that you pay much more for a phone when get it subsidized, because of the lock-in contract. That's why almost all phone users in EU buy regular unlocked phones and go from one carrier to another when rates change or carriers offer some special deals (keeping the number, of course).
Nokia is well off and the Maemo direction looks to be a great platform for the future of a cool phone company. US marked is a skewed monstrosity that is a tiny fraction of the global phone market and has no impact on the rest of the world.
They have to focus on choosing their next-gen platform. FAST.
I'm wondering what Nokia plans to do with the Maemo Operating System. Will it just keep it to it's internet tablet-phones or will it bring it over to products like the successor to the N97, etc. It could replace Symbian OS, which would not be a bad thing. I've seen plenty of videos of Maemo running and I'm fairly impressed. Nokia could have a good thing going here, but if they decide to shut off Symbian, this could leave a lot of consumers and developers in trouble. Even if Nokia decides to support S60, I'm pretty sure developers would stop supporting the platform (as if there wasn't already a low enough support for it from various companies) and switch to Maemo. Although it doesn't sound good, I would love for Maemo to become the successor of S60.
@ALBGunner04 It will on their high-end devices. Anyone who follows trends instead of pretending to be an "analyst" has seen the shift of s60 moving to lower end devices in the Nokia portfolio. However Maemo6 is what they want to be their "mass-market ready" version and that wont happen till late next year.
Also Symbian will not disappear anytime soon. Even if we forget the millions of worldwide users, the foundation is working hard on a road map that by Symbian^3 & ^4 offers a completely different UI/UX than anything today + has Qt as its app layer. Qt is the same layer used on maemo and apps developed on it can be ported amongst x86 (mac/pc),maemo,symbian & win-mo without much troubles!
These points have been made else-where but I guess the "wise ones" are more interested in spelling Nokia's doom!?
"might be profitable, but it's not a direction that leads to industry relevance or influence."
Hate to tell you this but EVERY business in the world is there for profit not for relevance or influence.
This is all US centric and lets face it the US has the most illogical splintered mobile networks in the world, and yes any phone manufacturer CAN afford to ignore the US because there is a HUGE market outside the US.