According to USEB, Sony Ericsson are going on the offensive in the coming years, and re-taking their place at the head of the smartphone market. As part of the same announcement, Chief Technology Officer Mats Lindoff said that they’ve over-diversified, bringing out too many similar mobile phones in different product ranges (i.e. two virtually identical mobile phones released in say, the Walkman and Cyber-Shot camps).
Well, yes, a lot of people have noted that. Sister-phones, call them, or the copy-paste strategy. A lot of people have said they don’t like that strategy of making multiple variants of every single mobile phone Sony Ericsson make.
Well, it seems that Sony Ericsson agree with them, so we can expect to see more individual mobile phones, not restricted by being cut-and-pasted from other product lines. A good thing, since it means phones like the Sony Ericsson C905 may well end up being individual one-offs, instead of having their personalities supplanted into another handset.
But Lindoff didn’t stop there…
He went on to talk about Sony Ericsson’s smartphone plans for the future.
They’re what we in the business call “ooooooooooooh, exciting“.
First up, the obvious thing… the Sony Ericsson X1, despite getting a worldwide release, is really designed first and foremost to crack America, since Windows Mobile is way bigger over there than Symbian. That’s based on the fact that if you mention Symbian to the average American guy on the street, they will (as confirmed on a trip to the land of the free), look at you as if you just pulled your own brain out through your nose. Windows Mobile on the other hand, they do know, and that’s why the Sony Ericsson X1 is such a big deal for that market.
As for Android, Mats Lindoff said they might look at researching and developing an Android phone at some point in the future, but don’t expect to see one for ages, purely because of resources.
Or not, because the next thing he announced is the big one. This is one of those “this is the single most important thing that was said in the presentation” moments. He mentioned what operating system is the way forward for them. And everyone should’ve seen this coming.
Symbian Foundation.
The open source version of Symbian (that I am predicting will be the single most important thing to EVER happen in the world of mobile phones, throughout the whole of recorded history), is going to be seen in Sony Ericsson mobile phones, and will pop up in their Xperia range. What’s surprising is the timescale. Next year, not two years in the future, implying that the Symbian Foundation is in a far more advanced state than anyone expected.
Finally, I want to end with the single most exciting thing Mats Lindoff said in the whole presentation: “We will launch a Symbian Foundation handset in the next year. There will be really high-end Xperia devices.”
Oh gawd, am I excited!
Want Windows Mobile power? Grab yourself the best Windows Mobile phone ever, the glorious Sony Ericsson X1!
