Many have been predicting for weeks iPhone Black as the 3G version. The latest flurry over the weekend when apparently AT&T listed it on their website. Oops! The problem with all these predictions is there is no rationale other than it is cool. Who’s asking why? Why aren’t they? I believe the mobile handset market is as blind to the iPhone as the VoIP market was to Skype when it launched. They now know it is cool but they still don’t have real strategies for it. More importantly, Apple’s strategy won’t follow the expected course.

• Why go from aluminum to black plastic?
• Why black and not any color? Etc.
• What’s the real story here?

I think it is simple and the answer is in India and Asia where thriving repair markets exist, along with fakes, knockoffs and copies. In any of these markets there’s the knowledge and the desire to open cases etc. If you sell millions it is even more important to make them simple to repair or fix.

• How long to fix or repair an iPhone screen?
• How long to replace a back plate? Etc?
• What are cost effective ways to get great upgrades?
• How do I make my iPhone really different? Is another Encase enough?

Sending phones back in for repair is simply too expensive and time consuming. While all the focus is on Edge to 3G versions the part that is missing is connecting the dots between “plastic” and Vodaphone launching in 10 markets. When Apple was ostensibly selling generation one all in the US it mattered not a jot that you could send it in for repair. There’s also still little reason to make it easy to open. Any competent Manish Market repairer can do it in seconds.

Plastic is the signal that Apple is going after it’s own self-organizing repair market. It wants real and fake cases for sale. Modding your iPhone is going to migrate to Asia and India where it’s cheap to make and install these parts. On the one hand Apple will be scared to death, modified cases can put video cameras on the front, and bigger speakers in the back etc. However there is nothing to stop this…. other than a warranty. Yet these repair jocks will guarantee their work, and be there for software upgrades and more. If I buy a Nokia in India I don’t return it to the Nokia store for repair. I simple go to one of these guys and get it done on the spot. I can’t see why Apple with fewer stores in these markets will be different. In fact helping them get some qualifications and putting iPhone approved on some of these aftermarket items will make more money for everyone.

There’s also one big difference. The iPhone modding market focuses on one handset; the iPhone. Apple is NOT going after a Nokia n-Series strategy. If the iPhone is to be more fashionable it will be accessorized rather than different versions. While one can expect an iPhone nano and iPhoneGiga (large touch screen page size) they make more sense than worrying about video’s, special cameras, bigger speakers etc. They will sell more when the iPhone has USB equivalents inside. Then it is more of a platform. The big deal here is there will be more iPhones sold than any single (except the low end phones) model. Thus mod’s in this form are more attractive and likely to emerge.  There’s a whole hardware market for the iPhone coming!

You want to see beautiful personalized iPhones? Take a look at this customizer. Then think rupees rather than dollars. Not quite but plausible. Color cases will be everywhere. If you want steel etc will be an option too.

It’s more important to consider this strategy if you are going to sell 100 million phones rather than 10 million. It’s also important if your volume is ratcheting up at a pace and in areas where you don’t have a support base and the carriers aren’t really your friend. It’s also a strategy that fits between the mobile market and the PC market. The iPhone is perhaps the best bridge.

I better provide another reason. Within the year more iPhones will be sold outside the US than in it. I don’t know what the iPod market has done relative to the US; the iPhone market will do much better. The product is simply more compelling.

Research that could be interesting?

• Give me 50 iPhone 8 top repairers and some design / plastics people…. It’s a certain market opportunity. I can think of 4 or 5 very likely super mods that would fly very quickly. Some that are cheap and other that go much further.
• Evaluate the “repair market” and “iPhone Accessories” opportunities in emerging markets. The assumption that iPhone accessories are “wrapper” and “dock” related is dead.
• iTunes store impact in the Internat Cafe and or with the “repair dude”. Many users won’t have the access we have to iTunes stores. Expect the synch libraries to be managed and charged for… Eg I will load x thousand songs, these videos etc onto it. Is there any limit to the number of iPhones that can be registered to one PC?

Now wouldn’t it be fun to mockup this scenario and act it out today? What would your repair outlook look like, what would hang on the shelves? What would the most common mods be? What price points? I see a market for iPhone accessories where the right kit could be 50% of the original cost. While I’ve been working the software / SDK scenario until now I’ve really neglected considering the hardware scenario. It could be rather interesting and quickly expand Apple’s range of opportunities.

18 months ago I bought my daughter a Nokia n73 in India as a birthday present. At the time it was about the coolest phone I could get for her with a 3mpx auto focus camera etc. She’s a torture test user. The first keyboard lasted one year before the whole joystick and keypad underpinnings needed replacing. (I did it with parts from eBay out of Hong Kong with instructions by YouTube). Just over a month ago the keyboard was dead again and this time the screen was cracked (stepped on) and the “zoom” / “volume” button was broken. The case was highly scuffed. It sounds bad and yet I think this is quite typical for a teenager who’s phone handles thousands of text messages. So broken phone in hand I took it back to India to get it repaired. In the US I would have no idea where to take it… and the cost would probably be prohibitive.

Here’s what I spent on it - a total of Rs. 2300 (less than $60). Rs. 1600 for a new “original” case (could have spent Rs. 350 for a knock-off case - couldn’t really tell the difference between the original and the knock-off), Rs. 300 for the joystick and Rs. 400 on the repair - changing of the case, replacing the joystick and keyboard, fixing the zoom which wasn’t working smoothly. And all of this done in one hour, in my presence. I was offered Rs. 4800 ($120) for the phone prior to the repairs. Cost of fixing was Rs. 2300 ($60). That’s half the price of what I would pay for a new phone.

You would be amazed at the number of “mobile” repairers. Most repairs are simple like the keyboard and case above. Some like the volume control required a little more expertise and surgery on the motherboard. Their equipment is almost non existent. A few in the building had a laptop and could update software etc. It’s a relatively low cost profession to get into. There’s no obvious qualifications and I’d expect that it is very competitive.

These are pictures of repair desks in the upper floor of Manish Market. While many of them were fixing the “China Phones” fixing Nokias and other models was common too. In fact one of Nokia’s strengths (not sure if by design or because of “fake” parts) is the availability of cases and keyboards. You can pick these up almost anywhere. Downstairs in Manish market these parts were all being wholesaled. You are in a place where anyphone can be fixed or even just upgraded with a new case etc.

At one stall I stopped and asked him about the “knowledge” and he responded that he had a “guru” (mentor). I tried to share that I’d learned some of this via YouTube and he looked at me completely blankly. Many of these repairers were sitting side by side. I’m not sure if they were “guru training” sessions or not. I was pointed to one larger repair outlet/store that was also providing training courses.

When I heard Jan Chipchase speak recently about these repair centers he reinforced how much easier it is to get into this repair business than the TV repair business. Both by “number” (more handsets than TV’s) and the limited space requirements or even can repair almost anywhere nature of this business.

I’d think a good portion of the business is also refurbishment. I didn’t see beaten up second hand phones for sale. Most are gleaming in new cases. These phones are usually recent 1 year to 18 months old and selling for approx half the cost of a new phone. It’s also a signal that “trading” one’s phone is common practice. Certainly the upper market kids I’ve interviewed are wanting a new phone and trading them in around the year point.

The repair market is central to accelerating learning and enabling rapid upgrading of phones. At first one just wants access. Then when the phone is also a radio that’s a “free” bonus. If it has a memory card they can also then play the music they want. Ringtones become a big thing too. The mobile is rapidly introducing more than just communications to the bottom of the pyramid.

We may not feel that a new mobile is much to brag about (although iPhone users like flaunting them!). For the most part they are inferior to other things we have that do…. music, TV, Video, surfing, mail, radio, clock, etc… If you have never had any of these you perspective is quite different.

For many the first phone brings greater economic success. Then you want to use it to express yourself. It’s like having a first car and then getting air conditioning in the second. I suspect that music is the single biggest driver for the first upgrade and increasingly that means the phone needs a memory card. A camera is the other driver although most phones have one now. Both of these create a demand for more sharing which bluetooth helps. Concurrently speaker phones and louder speakers become interesting. It’s now a tool for the family and entertainment as well as business. Trading up doesn’t take long.

Obvious pain points for trading up. Contacts! Although many don’t keep the contacts or the info on the phones as the mobile may not be private or personal in the sense that we treat it. At home anyone may use it. Example is used by a wife who may erase who she called so the cost wasn’t on her phone. And this sort of brings us back full circle. It also helps to explain why 12 and 13 year olds are so knowledgeable. They may well have brought the phone into the household. The mobile is a household decision or head of household decision.

When phones and aspirational new cases, new features and accessories are everywhere, it is easy to see that trading up, getting repairs and doing deals on a new mobile is part of the conversation. Most importantly this conversation is not controlled by the operators. As they don’t subsidize the phones and most users are prepaid, the phone you want and use is a personal choice. The economics not skewed by contracts in fact they are more likely to be influenced by resale value and availability of low cost parts. Whether by happenstance or design it remains one of the reasons Nokia has such a dominant share in India.

One learning then perhaps for many products in the emerging market. How do you create a robust repair and resale market? For developed markets… how do you do the same and empower DIY repairs? Also see Jan Chipchase’s post on informal repair cultures - Cultures of Repair, Innovation - at the end, he raises the question - “given the range of resources and skills available what would it take to turn cultures of repair into cultures of innovation?” I think it is already happening!

• SDForum - Teens and Tech
  This could be interesting. Small conference next week.
  (tags: teens research)
• Orb Enables Live TV on the iPhone
  TV on the iPhone; stream it anywhere from a home PC using ORB. Impressive.
  (tags: orb iphone tv)
• NanoWiki: Main/Nano Futures Scenarios Wiki: Main/Nano Futures Scenarios Wiki
  Scenarios on Nanotechnology. I find these too descriptive of how it will work and lacking in context… how we live with them, the tradeoff, perceptions and how we got there. Still they are interesting.
  (tags: scenarios futures foresight nanotechnology)
• Top 100+ Telecom Industry Blogs | VoIP Now
  Great list of top telecom blogs. I’m lucky enough to be included. Many of my favorite reads are on this list. Good place to start for any VoIP / Telecom company wanting to understand the impact of social media.
  (tags: voipnow voip blogging telecom)

A few years ago my brother gave me a book Investment Biker. Written by Jim Rogers a VC who took a motorcycle on a tour of the world and then from what he learned made investment decisions. I think we’d both like to follow that dream and ride around the world that way. I know from my many travels that each new place can fuel curiosity and insight.

I know I’ve been very lucky over the last two years to have lived for extended periods in India and visited many different parts. For similar reasons China has been on my wish list for years and I’m still not sure when I’ll get there.

Many years ago I also led a management team out of New Zealand and on a round the world learning journey. It changed how we approached the local market. It made us better at asking questions about what people do. We also were forced to ask ourselves why we did things in certain ways. We also ended up buying home grown costing software from Ireland. We brought stories back and told them. We put them into a local context. Reading about Sony in the Wall Street Journal today and there is a similar story.

The desire to travel and invest or expand and or import both ideas and learning are powerful reasons to reach out and explore different markets and the way things are done.

While I’ve been working more and more with Dina on research projects I’ve seen instances where the client never really gets into the market. It’s left up to the researchers. It’s also the research departments in firms (or suppliers to that firm) and often not the “product” or “innovation” teams that makes the visits. It takes a team to rethink a business and that must be cross disciplinary.

A few years ago the laundry business was rethought for the BOP, Base of the Pyramid and the case study for laundry sachets is widely known. It’s expanded to Shampoos too etc. While in India this last time I spoke with a company that was spending 100’s of thousands on product development research. They were completely lost. In fact I think the problem was they had sold a promise and an approach which was turning out to be both impossible and unlikely to deliver any product at all. They were focused on the consumer and income levels. However, they had failed to understand the systemic changes required to bring about change. Their problem was they hadn’t either found a good local guide and or found “remarkable” people that could really help them see new opportunities. In the meantime they were burning up their research budget.

I’ve found India fascinating. The need to research a company’s product opportunities and enter or improve growth in the Indian market being key motivators. I’ve also noted a growing trend. More teams and people are coming from the mothership. That’s good. It also means they are dwarfing the cost of the research with travel (most go business class) and five star hotels which aren’t cheap. Add in a week’s good living etc. and the real cost of the project may be buried in expenses. The local research cost relatively may be small.

This is both good and bad. Good that these teams are visiting and seeing things first hand. Bad, in that few companies are taking a broad enough view of the local immersion. Going half way round the world for a few groups misses out on too many other things that should be in the consideration set. The real ah ha….’s won’t come out of a single in-home visit or from listening into a focus group alone. More importantly to me is that the most innovative new products seldom come out of a group or a single insight. They come out of understanding the “friction” between different needs and environmental factors.

I’d probably argue that if you are spending on multiple global centers, I’d spend the same and expect more relatively in the markets that are exploding - china, brazil, india, etc… than in markets that your traditional success has come from.

Research costs are not the same globally, although great insight and advice always comes at a price. The simple fact is you can still do more groups, more in home, more ethnographies in emerging markets than you can in the US or Europe for the same bucks. Thus I’d argue invest the same bucks and expect to get more. Go more in-depth in these markets and then take home new questions and test them.[pic on right courtesy behavior research]

For the most part I still feel that local or domestic market research influences emerging market research. I think this is ass backwards. Use the emerging markets to influence how you think about your more traditional markets. You may be surprised by the results.

Then the cost of investing a few extra days in “learning” too is negligible. What it does require is a “guide”, access and planning. It can’t be random if it is to have impact. Recently a healthcare group came over. On day one they were “exposed” to traditional Ayurvedic Massage. Which also means “naked” (barring a loin cloth) and lots of oil being massaged into your skin and scalp. (It’s awesome and shocking the first time). That little event more than broke the ice - it created confidence and the desire to look at everything differently.

Its become common practice for us to encourage clients into this zone. Concurrently, it helps to capture lots of pictures or video. I think there are even more opportunities to share and create and there’s a need to take artifacts back home. The success in the end is the stories people tell when they go back home. Research should provide rich stories and easy ways to tell them. Linking them to learning points, remarkable people, things you have experienced first hand brings in the emotion and the passion for these opportunities.

While it is easy to talk “market research” or “customer insight” it’s all about learning and how that is transpired. We participate therefore we are! If you really want to energize your product development / management team, immerse them in a larger learning program and move the event into the emerging market, concentrate some research, confront their senses, provoke them with “radical - remarkable people” and help them create scenarios. Then evaluate back home after additional work and create the strategies on how your decisions should play out. That’s our approach at Mosoci!

I guarantee you will get a better return; on insight, on options, assessment and evaluation.

• Telly Provides Mobile Television to iPhone
  Packet Video www.pv.com serves up TV over WiFi using a small device to almost any phone. TV on the small screen gets closer.
  (tags: pv tv video iphone wifi)
• HTC Launches Latest iPhone Competitor
  Interestingly in a group of high end users in India “HTC” was being compared with the iPhone. HTC and touch screens were on their radar.
  (tags: htc iphone mobile+strategy research)
• TwitterFone: Send Messages to Twitter with Voice
  Pat Phelan’s new creation. Simple, easy.
  (tags: mobile mashup web2.0 twitter phone)
• Are telcos working together to make their own Skype?
  “While a collaboration of telcos are the least likely to do it, somebody can (and certainly will) steal Skype’s user-base, and, once it starts, it will probably happen much faster than anybody expects.”
  (tags: mrblog voip skype)

I’m sure many will ask me why buy the “China Phone” hadn’t I seen enough? Will you ever use one? The answer is simple. It’s a learning sample, an artifact to share, and something I can get a physical reaction and response to from others. Plus it cost me just over $100. And you can laugh as it won’t work in the US as it isn’t tri or quad band and it works on the wrong spectrum.

Then there is the fun I had haggling down the price and the very real reactions I had from top end users when I submitted it in an Indian focus group session (another post coming!).

From a product development standpoint where we are all ingrained with Nokia’s, Treos and iPhones it’s really nice to have something to play with that confounds both expectations and judgments. My “China Phone” (it will never be a Prince see the box) will never be a killer product here and probably wasn’t in China either. What it does is makes you see things differently. For me that is the point of many research projects. To think different, to see the world through a new lens. These are a few areas where my exposure to it has helped me think differently.

Think Different:

1. Sound! It’s louder than any phone I have ever had. It has four speakers. This sound perspective is much broader than just the mobile phone. It is about getting noticed in very noisy environments, it is about sharing music when hanging with friends or being able to fill a small room with sound. Here’s a contrast story (perhaps too close to home) my daughter complains her new iPod Touch doesn’t have speakers, it makes the iPhone way cooler for sharing. The Touch needs speakers. It also needs louder speakers. It really matters when sharing video.

What’s interesting is this sound perspective works into other product categories. Who’s ever heard of a phone that plays music better than a laptop, (better may be louder!). These phones beat my MacBook Pro. If you have such a phone would you buy a laptop for music or iTunes if it didn’t play it out.. or have longer battery life etc? And on this phone the speakers are understated. Others come with big round speakers and I saw 8 and 12 respectively on other phones.

Point is a simple phone of less that $100 has really re-framed what I’m seeing and begs a whole lot of new questions about sound and entertainment. The difference is the emerging Indian consumer is likely to purchase a new DVD, laptop, TV etc coming from a “mobile” perspective. By contrast we buy mobiles already having used those products which form our perspective. Mobiles for us.. tend to under deliver. They do browsing worse, play music worse, etc. In fact they are just plain hard. What I see in the China Phone on sound is they perform better (better means louder for some segments in India) than the “branded” models (Sony’s Walkman phone’s aren’t in the same league on music and yet are marketed on music).

2. Sharing and Service: The buyers of these phones don’t have a music collection. Music comes from some “music provider” who has a PC in the back-room and loads it onto the card. It’s a small fee or even free with the phone. As none of the users have ready internet access, bluetooth becomes a simple viral way to share. I still see little bluetooth sharing of files here. Once in a while, a picture. However, when the music is loud and audible… sharing and requests are more likely to come.

This phone has many smart phone features built in. Although how you transfer a contact list is not easy. I am so used to synching one Nokia with the next (it’s a real lock-in strategy) that I was pleased my iPhone could synch with my Mac. There’s no directory thinking in this China Phone. I’d have to start from scratch and that would be impossible. Sharing vcards is built in; probably another reason for the bluetooth.

3. Touchscreen: Yes it has a single touch screen. For most things it works better with the pen rather than the finger. I find the text input difficult although I can see how the touch screen really helps in China. For English letters it is just a slow input method. I’ve not really mastered it or found the setting I prefer.

I have to wonder why it has taken so long to get effective touch screens coming into mobile devices. I was using Palm’s handwriting 10 years ago on a PDA. Then abandoned. Apple’s typing touch screen on the iPhone is a huge leap forward when you see it like this. I’m convinced we’ve been too wedded to keyboards and small screens. Picture dial, buddylists are more effective than numbers. The days of the number centric phone are probably numbered. The question is what sort of keyboard is required.

China Phone - Prince A950.
Google it to find out more details. It’s basically the same size although thicker than my iPhone. The screen 320X240 is larger than my N95’s although less resolution. The aesthetics are generally good. The key pad is ok and generally I get how the keyboard layout works.

The menu system seems very Nokia-like although I don’t know what it is based on. There are no surprises in the menu. It follows what the traditional cellphone manufacturers do.

Quick / shortcuts are available for music, messaging and the phonebook. This works very effectively.

Sound is loud from the speakers. Even the 2mpx camera / video makes a very very loud and ugly click. The camera is ok but you wouldn’t buy this phone for its camera. Unlike many popular phones it doesn’t have a radio built in. However, the next step up in price has radios and TV’s built in. Sound for calling is only ok.

It has a connector cable that is both USB and charger ready. The charger is not elegant (similar to Nokia’s and is 110 to 240 volts ready. Thus you can charge from a PC or wall socket. You can also read the disk on a Windows PC. I couldn’t read this phone from the Mac. No synching appears to be available. My experimentation here was limited to putting on music and that took time. Most users of this phone would have someone put the music on for them.

The instructions are Chinese. It comes with a headset and second battery. There are two sim card slots inside. The battery is a good size, plenty of talk time here. There’s no warranty that I understand. Various people have told me that drop them a few times and it is done. Although I’ve visited a busy repair market for these phones.

This phone is not a status symbol in a brand sense; it is very good value and I can see why many budget users are moving up to them. The response here from my kid friends was generally favorable. It looks cool, the sound really stunned them and most wanted to make it work. It doesn’t look cheap. As I won’t be really testing it I can’t tell you how long it stands up to abuse. However, I suspect that more and more getting more than 12 months out of your phone without a rebuild / repair is good going. One thing missing in the US is an effective repair and rebuild market. It doesn’t exist because phones are just too cheap.

Overall, I’m impressed with this phone. We certainly lack the choice for mobile handsets in the US. I’ve seen hundreds of models for sale in the same place in Mumbai. As a purchaser you are probably better off buying a refurbished Nokia that’s a year or so old than buying this phone. However, then you would miss out on the latest statement. It’s a Ghetto Blaster Phone. I think they are likely to become a whole new genre.

• Internet television | Broadband TV
  Hong Kong leads with other small countries in pursuit.
  (tags: TV)
• Economist on Dell’s Outlook
  Good perspective on the challenges facing Dell. I don’t buy the “mini -pc” trend as the savior for emerging markets. I think there is a good chance the market may not have this right.
  (tags: dell PC computers)
• vTap - So What do you think?
  A new video service for mobile phones. Have put it on the try it out list.
  (tags: vtap veveo mobility iphone search TV aggregator video)
• Nokia’s Dream Phones - BusinessWeek
  This is more PR than good design. What it shows is that “users” can’t easily see something really different or new. I think I’m reacting with disappointment to these drawing and where they could lead. I hope the best stuff is somewhere else.
  (tags: Nokia mobile+strategy phones design mobile ethnography research)
• The State of the Facebook Platform | 20bits
  These numbers are not good! Don’t think it will come as a big surprise. Are you a developer leaving Facebook?
  (tags: facebook apps platform statistics)
• Marc Canter My Words are my Sword
  Good reason to love Marc and his posts! Thinking and positions are good for development. Keep asking questions!
  (tags: marccanter facebook ning)
• New App Fixes Nokia Select A Network Nag
  Switching seamlessly from wifi to edge is something the iPhone does well and my Nokias don’t. Jason Harrris points to a fix.
  (tags: gigaom nokia)

I’ve recently purchased a “China Phone” at Manish Market in Mumbai. I wanted to just have one as an example. Manish Market is the center of the “China Phone” trade. The building is ugly on the outside and dirty on the inside. It’s packed with two or three people crowding every kiosk. It’s noisy, busy and you are constantly bumping and squeezing around people.

There are shops many of which are wholesalers and then outside many men in front of glass cases filled with phones. After the 20th store (or is that booth) you start to recognize the phones, models and price points. For the most part the phones are very “foreign” here. They aren’t “name” brands. Where one sees name brands they are either “second hand trade-ins” or “fakes”.

Talk about “China Phones” particularly in villages and in poorer “slums” led me to this market. The key differentiator that has brought me here is the sound and that is “SOUND” as in loud speakers rather than the quality of the “call sound” which is almost irrelevant. I’m on the lookout for phones with more than 4 speakers. The first one I’m shown has a second backplate that acts like a subwoofer and can contain a second battery. It makes the phone almost an inch thick. This “extra sound” device is removable. The phone felt a little clunky with it.

At the next place I am shown a handset with eight speakers built into the back cover. Despite the noise it thumps out the hindi music. I figure you could run a small party on it. The resellers are telling me that they have them with up to 12 speakers. Sound is what is selling these phones; plus I think some “service” deals for kitting them out with music. The key price point appears to be about 4000 rupees just over $100. I’m already looking at the trading up options. I’m being shown similar phones (roughly iphone size) with inbuilt TV’s. The sales guys are a little skeptical about the TV. They cannot demo it inside the building; I’m less than certain that it really works. I quickly decide I don’t need one with a TV. They talk about the operating system like it is a “Nokia” clone. It has some similarlities and then obvious differences. All of the phones I’m shown have touch screens. For the most part they work better with the included in the case “pointing pen” although certain apps (music) really only need the finger.

I focus in on one model, with touch screen, four speakers, good volume. Each stop seems to get a cheaper price. I start asking about repairs. I’m told there is a full floor above with repair outfits that can fix or tweak anything. So now I have two posts coming; 1)the phone I purchased, and 2)learnings from the repair market.

Having almost made my decision the retailers invites us inside his store. We are offered Chai. Then we get the longer story. I get an upgrade to a 2gb memory card for an extra 400 rupees. (Most buyers would skip this / and or demand that it be filled with music for free). More phones come out. He now understands that we are researchers learning about the mobile phone market. He asks about our phones and is clearly thinking if they will buy one maybe they will buy more. Out comes a Nokia N95 and N73. The N73 looks original, the N95 8GB is poorly labeled otherwise it would be hard to tell that these are fakes. Booting the N95 I find it only has 1gb of memory. I have no idea about the camera. The slide is very tight. I’m told it comes from Thailand. The N73 was really perfect and right down to the battery. Both were available for “China Phone” prices. Thus the N95 fake was approx 5000 rupees for a phone that normally retails for 25000. The N73 was available for under 4000 (all rupees 38 to dollar). However, I’d think Nokia fakes in this market are a hard sell.

The owner then proudly pulled out his iPhone when I asked how much they cost. He was very proud of it. It was in a gorgeous leather case. It’s currently one of the real “status” symbols in India. What was interesting to me was his description. Eg it was “unlocked”. “Did he have other programs installed?” No! what’s that. Unfortunately I didn’t have mine there to show him. He really had no idea how to unlock it or use ziphone etc. This is probably typical behavior in India. He may not have a PC, it may not have iTunes on it etc. Instead “upstairs in the repair center” someone will have the knowledge and “unlock” them I actually doubt he ever synchs it with a PC and if he does it’s via someone else. One of the benefits of his approach. The unlocking etc.. is someone else’s problem. For the person that can afford an iPhone having “technical support” is really “low cost” and the songs etc.. will be virtually free.

The second hand market is robust. At the top end customers are trading in their phones after 12 months. By contrast the subsidies that we have on phones in the US and the expensive cost and difficulty in repairing phones here mean people hold them longer (2+ years with contracts) and have no way to dispose via a second hand market. All the second hand phones look like new. They all have new cases (fakes or originals) and new keyboards etc. A full refurbishment can take just a few minutes. While there I replaced the battery cover on my Nokia N95 (with which all my Indian pictures were taken!) as the hooks on one side were all broken. It cost me 300 rupees (7 dollars). I’m sure I couldn’t get this part anywhere quickly in the US other than maybe on eBay and that would come from Asia.

On Service. I have a wonderful picture below “tongue in cheek” of the value of a “China Phone” guarantee. I think these retailers would all give it more than one day. I also think they would go much further than any western retailer with after sales service. First they are selling it personally to me, they are part of a family business and their reputations are at stake. These are not Circuit City retailers. The salesman reinforces this to me with his business card and number. Call me with any set up problems etc. I’m fairly sure that had I been a more typical Indian buyer he would have put the music and videos on my memory card, and gone beyond the calling me to make sure it worked etc.

As I leave this market I come away with a new appreciation for the complexities that exist here. The “all in one” phone that Nokia has been a key provider of with Radio, limited music, and a camera is now being challenged. Nokia has the brand and you can buy one just like a second hand car yet the fashion has shifted. “China Phones” with their very loud speakers are the new Ghetto Blasters. Easier to share the sound and make a statement. It may not fit in our culture and yet in India it makes perfect sense. It’s likely to be the only phone you will hear over the traffic. It won’t challenge the top end and has quite a way to go to impact high end buyers who want brands, guarantees and resale value.

Yet what’s happening here is new and it is likely to affect more than phones, it going to affect anything that plays music and is in a small portable size.

At the top end it means I want much better sound and a lot more noise out of my iPhone and top end Nokia’s. The N81 is sweet but you cannot fill a small room effectively with it. The trend also suggests the possibility for new trends. Eg streaming one channel onto a second phone so you can have even more volume and better “stereo”.

When we take a look at the “repair market” we will see there are other opportunities for product innovation.

While my trip to India was based on other project work I jumped at the chance with Dina to create some “learning journey” space in villages and in the city. I believe it is times and visits like these that are invaluable for creating context and understanding. Some may argue that you can come at market research merely like a facilitator; however I’d argue that such a lightweight approach will end up with superficial results.

The deeper impact for me is how mobile is now framing the future of music, and media in India. Let me contrast this as the closing thought. Here in the US PC’s have been framing our multimedia experiences and if not PC’s it has been DVD’s and VCRs etc on the TV. We continue to hope that it will move to the mobile. That’s not true and will never be true in the emerging world. The whole idea of a “multimedia” PC will be foreign to a first time PC buyer. With no or limited “internet” still to speak of the mobile is more likely to fuel their expectations of what they might get out of a PC. To stick with my music comparison. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a Laptop PC that had 8 built in speakers. When you trade up from palm of the hand you expect something more. More volume, more screen size, touch elements!, memory sticks that are portable etc.

While the “mobile market is really really interesting, the really challenge may be with the PC makers who need to understand the meaning of mobile to understand where and what will frame their offerings for the future.

More pictures here.

I made three new friends while in the Dharavi Slum in Mumbai. At first they just tagged along and then as we stopped at various mobile kiosks, photo booths they caught on to my interest in mobile phones and what was being used.

These three kids were some of the smartest I’ve ever met on my travels. They were 12-13 years old and school was now out for summer. The boys had each worked at different jobs during the morning. They had each earned about 150 (4 dollars) rupees which goes to the family. They had older buddies that had phones and more although they themselves did not.

This is Ashok, Ajay and Yousuf. After stopping at a kiosk where another boy was using a China Phone (no sims) as a MP3 player they began telling me all about the “china phone”.

* Two sim card slots. You can be in a call and take a call from another person with some.
* From four to seventeen speakers (although none had seen one with more than 12) very loud
* Nokia sound is terrible. Nokia is not cool.
* Has touchscreen you can use your finger or a pen.
* If it falls four times it will break.
* Repairs are a problem.
* You can buy one at “Manish Market” (where I headed later)

I learned that for kids the cellphone is first a family decision. They don’t have money… it goes to the family. Or the kids may get the phone into the house, introduce it.

We then stopped by a bank. Well only sort of. It was in the street. They were handing back ATM like cards. Even if you lost the card you never lost your money as they were linked to a finger print reader. Again it was these kids that were telling me how it worked. The bank staff said nothing really throughout the exchange.

As we left them they said they were going off to the old Fort to hang out and try and get mangoes off the tree. They were still kids! Despite stories I’ve read either this part, or this time of day didn’t make this slum, their life or where I was seem dangerous. These kids seemed on track to a much better future. I really hope they get there.

Often a smile does it. These kids adopted me and were asking my name out of curiosity and to catch my attention. They didn’t expect anything. In the end a treat of some “candies” was welcomed. They were just plain friendly. They were even willing to jump in the car and take us to other parts of Mumbai.

Kids do tell you a lot about how life works and their aspirations. They are keenly aware of what’s hot and what’s not. I’m not sure these were that unusual; they were tech savvy. Had I handed them any phone I’m sure they could have operated it; the same way kids may play on a new gaming system at a friends house and then talk about it later.

If I had one real take away from this group. Nokia is in trouble at the 4000 rupee price point. The “China Phone” had the music and the cred on this street. Its cool! Perhaps not with those that have real money or everything, but for those that want to “PLAY” music together and be noticed there’s nothing that compares.

I left this group knowing I was going to “buy” a “China Phone”. A new thought beginning in my mind that Nokia, Sony and too a lesser extent Samsung LG and others have “missed” something that is changing the category and redefining use. Add in the iPhone at the top end and the “mobile handset” market is much more competitive than I had thought. The important thing is that something is happening here and it wasn’t visible to me six months or even three months ago.

For more photos

I just returned home from India and the first chore is doing the “washing”. Throwing the clothes in the Kenmore will have some special meaning today after visiting Dhobi Ghat last week where the Dhobi’s flog the clothes on the stone.

There is an expression… “it all comes out in the wash”. Dhobi Ghat gives new meaning to this cliche.

Often described as the world largest open air laundry in practice it is hard to see quite how everything comes out so so clean. Strong bleach I’m sure. The washers are two feet in a square concrete tank and seem to enjoy beating clothes to death. It works very effectively. In fact these entrepreneurs rent the stalls from the Mumbai City for 300 rupees a month (just repeating what I was told; thus about $7.50. The fee for a clean ironed and starched business shirt is about 10 rupees. Call it 25 cents! Apparently even the Taj Hotel sends shirts here (and they will charge you US rates for the same day service). Can’t be sure of course. The labeling system was beyond me. Inked paper on a thin thread. There are actually many groups working here.

More Pictures and a Video here

I made my first visit to the Dharavi Slum yesterday. Often described as Asia’s largest slum it remains central to Mumbai’s development and thriving economy. I have a few stories and themes that I want to weave together.

I cannot help having the stark contrast in mind when we define the US middle class. Recently the US election candidates have been touting income spans up to $200K as middle class for tax packages and planning. I grew up with the stereotype of two cars in the suburbs and a color TV. This isn’t what middle class means in India, even though they now talk about a middle class approaching 250 million. It isn’t the middle class we know and yet this group is changing everything and on the cusp of India’s change and boom.

What’s middle class? In part, this is what I saw with my eyes and yet the other details I cannot begin to get my head around. In the Dharavi Slum you may have up to 650 families per acre. Redevelopment programs are happening and people are being displaced; although it is hard for me to see how this place would be better as a result of such developments. There continues to be local resistance to these programs.

Sakina invited me into her home. Entry is by a steel ladder. Her home is much lighter than the home below with a “clearstory” open air skylight. In total it is 225 square feet. Basically 10 feet wide and 22 feet deep. Near the entry there is a nicely tiled toilet and shower and running water. (This is not common!) She has a small kitchen with LPG stove and refrigerator. The house also has a TV (older) a landline phone for inbound calls only and an Aquarium close by the front door. Bed and bedding cover the rest of the space. I sit on the bed almost afraid to stand with the two ceiling fans on and not wanting to tower above them.

While drinking Chai members of her family come and go. Her son is in the 9th Standard (15 years old) and will get a cellphone after passing the 10th standard she says. Her daughter in law comes in and starts preparing vegetables. She squats on the floor and starts cutting them in her hands and dropping them into a stainless steel bowl. Pottery or china is a luxury with perhaps the exception of tea. You can see why everything is done sitting on the floor or perhaps sitting on the bed. They will eat sitting on the bed probably watching TV. I don’t even remember a chair or stool in the place. No table.

Her husband works in Dubai she didn’t want to go and leave family and work permits probably made it impossible. I must say the room was spotless. She had a mobile phone. No PC, or computing equipment in the house. A huge picture of Mecca. Many of her family members work outside Dharavi. For many it’s a choice to continue living here. My guide too although his “car for hire” business is run from one of the suburbs.

After having tea we dropped down into the street. Two doors down, downstairs I entered a similar sized space. 4 people were making sandals. These were for wholesale and would be branded later. They make 15 to 20 pairs a day. They had a number of clear plastic bags against the wall. It represented about a weeks work according to them.

Upstairs there was a T-Shirt manufacturer. Maybe 5 sewing machines. All were busy. There was almost no room to move in there. They would have gladly stopped for me. Oh did I say it was close to 100 degrees in all of these spaces? You can also forget about safety, wiring, etc.

Both these factories would appear to be owned by the same person or someone in the family and perhaps some relation to Sakina. Not really quite clear. They all pointed out the Redevelopment Banner. I really can’t see how they would be better as a result. I doubt they enable the factories in these new housing centers.

Around the corner there are STD (phone kiosks) everywhere. I passed an Internet cafe in this area (15 rupees per hour, no discounts etc.) There were 7 PC’s in it and the owner actually worked for another man managing clothing production for Marks & Spencer. The cafe was full.

This world remains a long way from being connected beyond the cellphone. Then I learnt more about that from a group of 13 year olds and that’s another story.

This little visit and snapshot for me was invaluable. Too few companies and visitors come and see these things. While you can commission research in India unless you have a keen eye or some way of internalizing that knowledge back home you aren’t going to come up with better products. Often it’s a few stories that you will take back home Whether Finland, Chicago, or Palo Alto you won’t begin to understand “sound” or “dust” or “recycling” in an Indian context.

Let me close with a couple of examples. PC Dust covers (not seen in Dharavi but covering electronics is common) and just the thought of a hot laptop burning one’s thighs (where are the tables!) or the inadequate speakers that laptops come with. Laptops fit the space better and it would be worth exploring the “lap” factors. Similarly, my learning from the “China Phone” (yet another story) is that all laptops have inadequate audio built in. They cannot even compete with the latest phones for “music”.

In a market that is exploding with mobile phones (10 million sold last month) low end laptops (15000 to 20000 rupees) are competing against them (full featured china phone 4000 to 6000 rupees) and new TV’s (5000 to 10000 rupees). I didn’t go into the PC markets this time. I’ve visited them in Delhi in the past and just running out of time.

I just suspect that the ALL in One that we see in mobiles (There are “China phones” available with TV’s built in plus the MP3 and FM radio) means…. no requires one to really rethink the multimedia laptop. I certainly would be if it was my job! There are a huge number of opportunities here and a dumbed down Macbook is not the answer.

For a few more pictures. Huge thanks to Dina for arranging it. I’m cross-posting this week.

• The Impact of Low Cost Telephone Transport
  Nicely stated metaphor.
  (tags: ifbyphone voip telephony)
• Twitter’s Success: It’s the Ecosystem
  Mark Evans writes up Twitter. I’m inclined like him to believe that the twitter eco-system is just getting started. Most of these I’ve tried out. Thwirl is what I’m using most.
  (tags: markevans twitter socialnetworking applications)
• AT&T to Cut 3G iPhone Price By $200
  I think I’d be disappointed if this happened. I’d like to see subsidies go away. Then perhaps it means Apple will sell unlocked phones at at $200 premium. More important perhaps is what ATT sees in the opportunity and the impact on “family” plans.
  (tags: iphone att mobile)
• Supernova 2008 - Mobile Connections - Competition
  Got a great mobile idea? Not quite ready but want to spill the beans for Techcrunch and Supernova? Perhaps this is the opportunity.
  (tags: techcrunch supernova08 mobile)
• Pakistani goverment to increase termination rate to 10c
  This is nuts! Hope it gets turned over!
  (tags: pakistan telephony)
• iPhone Dual SIM adapter
  Just need a global sim card with free inbound calling. Reliance just announced such a product in India. Then free inbound calls anywhere. Could be cool. Will have to look at the price.
  (tags: simcard mobile iphone GSM)
• SIM4travel - What is SIM4travel
  Recently purchased by Truphone it provides free inbound calls to 50 countries. Not free in the US and US numbers not yet available.
  (tags: