Category: Cell Phone Talk
I stumbled across this tonight and figured it might interest some of you.
Taken from
http://www.mobilecrunch.com/2010/11/17/sharp-and-panasonic-finally-ready-to-sell-smartphones-worldwide/
"To say Japanese cell phone manufacturers are late in jumping on the smartphone bandwagon would be an understatement. In Japan, the iPhone eats their lunch, and internationally, things look even worse. In fact, Sharp, Panasonic, Kyocera, Hitachi and other makers have basically stopped selling phones of any kind outside Japan years ago.
But now two of the biggest players in Japan, namely Sharp and Panasonic, seem to be ready to enter the smartphone market – and on a worldwide level.
Sharp has already announced two nice-looking Android 3D phones for the Japanese market a few days ago (pictured above) and is planning to sell a total of 5 million smartphones a year in Japan alone soon. After talking about expanding overseas for a long time (and not really following up), big S this week said it plans to start rolling out said 3D handsets in the US, India, and China next year.
Reuters yesterday reported that Panasonic follows a similar strategy (releasing smartphones in Japan first, and in overseas markets second). According to the report, Panasonic will release Android handsets in Japan next year and in the US and other places in 2012 (these better should be worth waiting for).
The company gave up international handset sales in 2006 but now wants to boost worldwide sales to 15 million units by 2015 (Panasonic sells around 5 million handsets in Japan per year)."
While I'm not sure if I'll get one, I'm really glad to see that Japan is catching up in this market. Considering their high quality tech, I'm sure these will be great. I might even be tempted to try one. lol
My very first gsm phone was a Panasonic one and I loved it.
It broke just as fast as my second Chinese made phone (and besides, even if it is Panasonic, there is no guarantee they are made in Japan, and I do not believe it makes any difference in terms of quality).
Nevertheless, I was fond of that phone, good design, good size, very comfortable, so I would look at a different model from them.
But what it comes down to is the operating system and software capabilities of the phone, not really the manufacturer.
Well, that's not a good thing at all! Perhaps, you're right, and it really was made in China. I've never had true Japanese tech break on me like that, though I suppose it can happen. I do know of a laptop from Sony that's made in Japan but extremely delicate. Would I have liked your gsm phone? You mentioned size and I'm a fan of large phones, though those are hardly findable today.
Agreed with WB, anymore it's the OS and the apps that can run on it.