The High and Low End Phones - 2019

High End of Phones - Folding screen Phones

2019 will remain special for smartphone enthusiasts as foldable phones made their way to shelves. The first one to be commercially available (Royole FlexPai) was the one which was most critisized by reviewers due to it's no confidence inspiring hinge for screen fold and inappropriate software experience. 

Samsung fold gained most attention as it's screen started to rip days after it was handed to reviewers. Reviewers had removed a film on screen that wasn't supposed to be. Samsung got away from Note 7 like fiasco as this came to lime-light before public launch. Despite initial negative feedback on screen fragility, Samsung fold recieved worldwide acceptance on it's relaunch, as being the best attempt for a folding phone by any smartphone maker in 2019.

Huawei Mate X was seen as strong competitor to Samsung Fold at it's showcase event, but it never got available to buy for common people, most probably due to U.S. ban on Huawei. 

Motorola Razr's re-introduction in late 2019 as folding screen phone revived nostalgia.

 LG took a more conserative approach with it's G8X ThinQ, launching it with two fully seperate screens held in case. Looking at leaked images of Samsung next foldable, folding screen phones future seems to be good. Folding screen phones in early stages are very expensive and defintely not for rough usage. It is very hard to comment on time frame till which we can expect a good folding screen phone in budget segment but this feature will likely remain a hot topic in 2020.

Low End of Phones - Feature Phones

Unlike smartphone, feature phone market has continued to grow in last three years. More than 400 million feature phones were sold globally in 2019 and this number is expected to rise to 1 billion by 2021. India and Middle East Africa capture more than half of global feature phone market share. iTel, Nokia, Jio and Samsung are major feature phone makers worldwide. Nokia showcased two interesting feature phones in 2019 - Nokia 2720 Flip and Nokia 800 Tough.

As the name suggests, Nokia 800 tough is IP68 and MIL-STD-810G certified making it dust, water and shock resistant. Powered by the Qualcomm 205 mobile platform, it runs on KaiOS. It is made for those who prefer weeks long battery life but still want to keep in touch of digital world with apps like google assistant, facebook and whatsapp.

On the other hand, Nokia 2720 flip has a claimsheel like design with small outer display for notifications, revealing a much larger inner display on flipping it open.   

FEATURE PHONES : STILL ALIVE, BUT WHY ?

Nokia Banana phone
 Source : theverge

First of all, let's get some recent fact and figures out of the way...

According to Counterpoint Research, global feature phone shipments increased 3% annually reaching 112 million units in Q-3 of 2018. Global feature phone shipment grew consecutively for four quarters from Q-4 2017 to Q-3 2018 whereas smartphone market experienced a small decline in global shipments during the same period. 

Here is a graph depicting the contrast in shipments between smartphones and feature phone markets.

Image source: counterpointresearch

Where does sale of feature phone comes from?

Around 90% of feature phone market is in Asia and Africa. More specifically, Middle East and Africa (MEA) and India account for more than 70% of feature phone global sales. 

Reliance Jio created disruption in feature phone market with introduction of Jio Phone and Jio Phone 2, which drove global sales of feature phones in Q-1 and Q-2 of 2018. In Q-3 2018, Jio phone sales slowed down in India after the initial hype surrounding Jio phone of effectively free price tag. MEA emerged out to be the largest feature phone market owing to shipments growth rate of 32%.

Still wondering...How and why feature phones make a sizable and relevant market?

Affordability

There are still millions of low-income people in developing nations with basic phones. An upgrade from a basic phones to feature phone puts much smaller burden in pockets of these consumers as compared to an upgrade from feature phone to smartphone. Due to high purchase cost of smartphones, feature phones dominate smartphones in poor developing parts of the world. 

Ease of Usability

The problem with majority of old people is that they are very slow and reluctant in learning new things. Features phones have limited options, thereby making it much easier to learn to operate as compared to a smartphone. When compared to smartphones, one of the most compelling attributes of feature phones which makes it the best option for needs of old age people is big battery life.

A longer battery life is also particularly useful for people living in developing countries where a large population has no proper access to electricity and people are often dependent on charging stations.

4G Revolution

Just like smartphones, features phones are also now available with option of 4G connectivity. These 4G enabled feature phones are a compelling upgrade option for already existing feature phone users because they act as affordable option for these these low-income consumers to experience internet for the very first time. Partnership of Kai Os with feature phone OEM's has also brought several useful apps on these 4G feature phones like Whatsapp, Facebook, Youtube and Google assistant, which were smartphone exclusive some years ago.