The Feature phone rises (again?)

7/24/2012 1:49 PM EDT

thank you Yunko, interesting thoughts...but before we go into Firefox phones don't we have to establish Firefox OS is an estaqblished operating system? For most people (including me) Firefox is just another browser...Kris

7/24/2012 2:46 PM EDT

Isn't RIM's new OS, BB10, also HTML5-based? If so, it can be a big competion to Firefox OS.

7/24/2012 3:06 PM EDT

Admittedly the distinction is blurry. Even entry level phones have contact management (including calendar), SMS and some even have E-Mail, so the chain is evolutionary, rather than revolutionary.

That being said, there are a number of feature I personally would consider mandatory for any phone I carry. Some of these might eliminate this new (returned) category:
1. Internet access (via carrier) - browsing and E-Mail
2. Wi-Fi access as an alternative to data over the carrier. In fact T-Mobile has the ace here in that you can even make and receive cell phone calls over Wi-Fi. I live and work from a home office that is out of cell range.
3. Operating environment that supports a broad set of applications. I have things from topo maps, to Telnet, to Wi-Fi analyzer to multiple translations of the Bible. Unless there is a solid platform that developers are writing for, many of these types of things won't be available. Skype is a biggie for me, because of being out of cell coverage. Wi-Fi access makes it a common denominator for communiations.
4. Open architecture. OK, this is somewhat unique to me, but my Android MUST be rooted. It is a computer and I'm a programmer.

Obviously the carriers would like to control everything they can, but I think (and hope) that competition is going to work against that. It only takes a few cracks (a carrier who touts the advantages of an unbundled approach) to make that wall come down. Android is at least a step in the right direction, because it takes a lot of control away from the carrier, and is, at least in theory, open.

While I'm sure it is just the opposite of what the carriers want, I'm looking for a future where the carriers supply a pipe and little more.

7/24/2012 3:26 PM EDT

A few days ago I learned that decent feature phones had disappearred since we'd last bought ours. My wife misplaced hers and to the store we went to replace it. We were surprised to find that our choices were smartphones (which she did not want, and did nto want to pay the hefty monthly data fee for), or caveman-simple stupid phones. it was a downgrade, not an upgrade. Her new phone has a poorer camera, and lacks other niceties of her old phone.

Really, why can there not be a healthy middle ground between the bottom of the barrel crap and the super fancy and overly expensive smart phones? I'm very disappointed to live in a world where class warfare has killed off the cellphone middle class.

7/24/2012 3:28 PM EDT

I'm not sure there's a market for a feature phone anymore. It's not the end-user price at issue ... you can check on Amazon.com right now and find a dozen or more smartphones, free with contract.

The original model for the feature phone pretty much failed, and largely due to the telcos greed I think. The primary difference between a smartphone and a feature phone isn't price, it's control. A smartphone has an active developer community and non-telco-controlled access to applications. They follow the usual PC model of software: buy it, it's yours.

Feature phones usually had a small number of built-in premium features, really an extension of the better "dumb" phones' growing set of built in applications: calendar, alarm, calculator, games, etc. You could probably do rudimentary web browsing, and for that, you paid a monthly fee, but something less than that of a smartphone. And then there were the apps: your telco could sell a limited set of apps. And that, I think, was one of the main killers. Because you typically paid very high prices for apps, and many were monthly fees. So pretty soon, the feature phone cost more than the smartphone. Some even let you buy music downloads... for $2.00-$2.50 per song, not transferable to other devices.

It's usually about the monthly charges, since you can always get a "free" phone, even a smartphone. This is what killed the Microsoft Kin... a phone oriented toward kids, with a $30/month network access fee? No kid thought it was as cool as an iPhone, no parent thought it was worth another $360 per year... kids are already too expensive.

7/24/2012 3:28 PM EDT

And therein lies the problem with the Mozilla phone. These will be far more dependent on the net than any smartphone. Sure, HTML5 can cache apps, but the whole point of Boot to Firefox will be allowing much cheaper phones to be built, and that's largely going to be using less flash storage, moving everything online. Which means more use of network time, which is actually far more expensive than flash memory in a short while. Telcos won't offer these with lower monthly fees; if anything, they're likely to wind up being more expensive. Just like a feature phone, once the features are used. The telcos are trying to lower their net congestion... I don't think these help. We'll see...

7/24/2012 4:27 PM EDT

Need to keep in mind that there are 3 continents where majority of people (most of Asia, Africa, South America) find a full feature smartphone is way too expensive to be realistic (even assuming a 3G/4G infrastructure were available). Slim margins yes, but a huge market, nonetheless. Nokia provides phones into this market, Apple could not be bothered.

7/24/2012 4:42 PM EDT

Great article. I recently raised the question of feature phone v smart phone to our user community and generated quite a debate. While the smartphone manages much of the processing for web and apps at the device and tends to deliver a better experience over higher performance networks (3G or better), there are 100s of millions of feature phones generating "smartphone-like" experiences by leveraging the network backend for apps and browsing over 2G networks. Mozilla has a lot of catching up to do with Opera Mini, Nokia Browser and UC Browser.

7/24/2012 4:50 PM EDT

I've been on trains in Japan and the US. Pretty much everyone under the age of 40 has a phone with a big screen (aka smartphone). Flip phones from 15 years ago had web browsing and music players (primarily java or windows based). That was a full 10 years before iphones showed up. Only the geekiest were willing to put up with the excentricities. As long as any smartphone is relatively easy to use (and the Windows phones qualify) and the price is right, all but the stodgiest of users will embrace them.

7/24/2012 5:45 PM EDT

I have to agree with hazydave. At least in the U.S., the main difference between the feature phone and the smartphone wasn't so much the price of the phone as it was the carrier's control over the phone and the user -- and the carrier's ability to nickel and dime the feature phone user with a limited selection of apps, ringtones, music downloads and location-based services that were for the most part uniquely tethered to that particular phone.

As hazydave indicated, a feature phone user who actually used all the capabilities and apps offered on his phone could easily end up spending more per month than a smartphone user.

"Smartphone" and "feature phone" describe business models as much as they describe devices, and increasingly consumers are opting for the freedom of choice offered by the smartphone business model.

The cell phone and carrier service market in other countries, especially in the developing world, has always been different than in the U.S. But increasingly, competition is starting to favor the smartphone business model -- lower service costs and freedom of choice -- in those countries as well.

This discussion is rather timely in light of an article that appeared earlier today about the changing landscape of cell phone usage in Kenya -- particularly the reduced service costs and the social transformation that mobile banking has fueled. Today, nearly 60% of Kenyans use their phones to shop, pay all their bills, and move their money around. Does it really matter whether their device is considered a feature phone, an entry-level smartphone, an mid-range smartphone or a high-end smartphone? The point is, the business model is no longer the "carrier's choice" feature phone model, but the "user's choice" smart phone model.

http://worldnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2012/07/24/12909129-kenyans-use-cell-phones-for-everything-from-buying-groceries-to-paying-rent?chromedomain=worldblog

7/24/2012 6:15 PM EDT

Aren't we simply dealing with a moving target here? This simply changes the definition of "feature phone" to "low end smart phone". The definition presented for feature phone in this analysis would have *been* a fairly high end smart phone not that long ago.

One of my contentions is that down the road, _all_ cell phones will be smartphones, simply because they *can* be. The steadily increasing power, and decreasing size and cost of components, have made things possible at progressively lower price points, and I don't see that trend stopping any time soon.

"Reuters, earlier this month, reported that “Telefonica has said the [Firefox5-based] phone price will be significantly cheaper than the low-end Android models, meaning Firefox phones can be priced at levels around $50 excluding operator subsidies.” This compares with a price of around $200 for a typical smartphone."

Indeed, *now.* Think 5 years ahead based on current development trends and tell me what it looks like. That $50 phone will *be* today's "$200 after heavy carrier subsidy" model. What will tommorrow's feature phone be?

7/24/2012 6:18 PM EDT

Framing this discussion between "smart" and "feature" phone seems to be somewhat semantical to me...what is "smart" today will likely be "dumb" 10 years from now...the essence seems to be what features are really needed for low end market to be successful on a massive scale in Asia, South America and Africa..and what is the business model of selling those phones...kris

7/24/2012 10:35 PM EDT

Feature is long dead and won't rise. Smartphones are the real thing.
As an analogy, Pcs started off with $1000 and are now available at 199.
Same will be smartphone story.
They started off at 600 and because of the wider reach(3b ppl), will hit $50 very soon.
Like pcs, All devices will have the same functions and features.
User experience will determine how much premium it can command.

7/24/2012 10:41 PM EDT

I used to be a Silicon Valley engineering director, then I became an academic and took a breath-taking paycut. I have four "feature phones" from Verizon and still have a $170 monthly bill. It is far too much IMHO. Companies all fight for the business of the wealthy, but there are far more people who are struggling and who just need phones -- indeed they are the folk that go for the pre-paid phones. No one wants to go after the low end, but the low-end frequently consumes the high end (think PCs and workstations/mainframes). I also have philosophical objections to expensive closed architectures. Yes -- I can buy cheap apps for an iPhone, but I don't want to pay data charges ... PERIOD -- so I won't use a smart phone, or the browser on my dumb-phone. The "feature phone" is not dead ...

7/24/2012 11:00 PM EDT

The demand for low end button phones will always be there. For sub$20 price points, that is the only feasible option.
outside of US, phones are purchased without contract. There people spend money on how much they consume. There are so many tiers for data and cellular usage that allows u to buy what u can consume..
Thats the big market benefitting w the low end smartphone rise.

I have already seen Sub $70 smart phones in china and SE Asia and they have all the basics right( wifi, touchscreen etc)
Agree w author that Firefox may be the big thing going forward.

7/24/2012 11:33 PM EDT

To @pcardout
170$ a month for the feature phone doesn't make much sense
I am paying 60$ a month for iPhone
Just switch!
Kris

7/25/2012 7:35 AM EDT

There is always place for the cheaper and better alternatives from the market. Mozilla OS could become successful if they become open platform to run any OS apps.

7/25/2012 9:15 AM EDT

I tihnk the conversation threads above show a very astute observation. As Frank Eory pointed out earlier (as well as so many others above), the distinction between feature phones and "entry-level" smartphones actually boils down to the different business models (by which, I mean, that of operators), instead of hardware/software in handsets (which I wrongly thought it was).

Obviously, many of us living in the U.S. are tired of paying too much for data plans.

It's almost ironic that technology is no longer a key factor enabling cellphone communication accessible to many people in the world. It is the operators' business plan!

7/25/2012 12:53 PM EDT

" the definition of smartphones vs. feature phones, in my opinion, is fundamentally phony", you nailed the weakest point about this whole drame, Junko. Even if a smartphone has all the necessary features that a smartphone should have but only for a namesake then should we consider it as smartphone? Also, with time the definition changes as the technology matures or improves.

7/25/2012 7:50 PM EDT

Is it not possible to get smart phone with data plan and subsequently cancel the data plan with $100 penalty? This way it is nice to get good phone at lower price.

7/25/2012 8:11 PM EDT

Nice try @hm, usually not possible though...

7/26/2012 3:13 AM EDT

Timely article here on the exit of Feature Phones in SE Asia.

Why Motorola, Sony, LG, Acer ditched feature phones -http://asia.tmcnet.com/news/2012/07/19/6449599.htm

7/26/2012 3:41 AM EDT

Self contradictory: a "Mozilla OS" phone *IS NOT* a "feature phone", it is as a matter of fact a smartphone.

Second thing is JavaScript. It is an awful alternative to both native code (as Object-C) and (even) to Java due to two factors:

1. JS virtual machine is even less effective than JVM (e.g., Dalvik in Android), nothing to say about native code.
1. JS programs are unstructured crap, hardly maintainable when they grow over 1000 lines of code. What else can one expect from a hack created in 10 days to save a burning Netscape release?

Despite industry monsters like Intel and Mozilla may push the HTML5/JS paradigm to the market and half-educated WEB programmers would think they are at last able to write a functional program, this a blind way due to the aforementioned factors.

7/27/2012 12:17 PM EDT

The data plan is a way to go.

For a long time, I don't need a fancy data plan to my cell phone plan simply because I rarely pull data from the Internet while I am on the road. Primarily, I used my cell phone to make a call and receive a call.

Since I have started using smartphone, I wonder why I need to subscribe to voice plan. The social network trend and the amount of information simply push me to the mobile Internet.

Is it the smartphone pushing mobile data or the information driving the smartphone? It will take a long debate and everyone would have their own opinion. Nonetheless, I am sure most people will agree smartphone has opened up new opportunities. More and more people are driven to mobile data. With the openness of VoIP, there are tremendous number of VoIP startups joining the market, trying to get a share of voice market from the major telecommunication carrier, e.g. AT&T. Really soon, voice will be served over packet data network, in specific, IP. You will be able to download different VoIP clients (aka telephone) into your smartphone and start making voice and receiving voice call from it. Depending on the client, you may be able to use multiple VoIP providers. Or you may need to have multiple clients, e.g. 1 for personal and 1 for business.

Feature phone vs smartphone. In short, they will both exist as long as voice communication is still in demand. Feature phone may just exist in a software form resided in a smartphone.

7/27/2012 3:02 PM EDT

I would relate this to the chrome book from google where everything is running off the browser. Using HTML5 is definitely a cool concept for developing apps. Probably there need to have some sort of AppStore to host all these HTML applications. I know lots of games are based on HTML5 already.

7/28/2012 4:07 PM EDT

This has taken a lot of comments! It's a hot topic.
I'm in favor of this to work. This means there's a market opportunity for middle level phones that's being unattended. As some comments show, if people are pushed to the low end or the high end they will not be happy.
The idea of getting a pool of developers from the web through the use of HTML5 programming language it's a powerful one.
The market exists and if Mozilla is unable to correctly orchestrate this, some other will.
Also, this would make Mozilla grow as a company because integrating an open source and free operating system with a phone requires engineering services. Mozilla will not only be a web browser developer. Interesting.

9/28/2012 12:00 AM EDT

Especially in many developing countries, feature phones are becoming more popular due to their price and functionality. The battle of Samsung and Apple has not reached its heights everywhere in the world, and $40 phones can definitely find its market. Those entry level phones are the entry point for customers who do not have the big budget for better phones, but will help to build brand loyalty.
David - http://www.jzandf.com