back to article Europe turns nose up at new smartphones: Beancounters predict 7% sales drop

Sales of smartphones in Western Europe are expected to fall 7 per cent to 141 million this year, as consumers shun expensive upgrades on devices offering little more than an incremental updates. Worldwide smartphone shipments DOWN for first time ever READ MORE Globally, smartphone sales will rise just 0.2 per cent this year …

  1. lglethal Silver badge
    Thumb Down

    really? 5G as the big draw?

    Because 4G was such a big draw over 3G? Can anyone actually remember the difference between 3G and 4G? I mean maybe its a little bit faster. Dont know, cant say I've particularly noticed. My phone says I'm using 4G at the moment. I cant say I've noticed any "killer" differences between the two.

    So whats 5G going to offer? It'll be a little bit faster? Will I even notice? Does it come with unlimited downloads? Nope, I'm guessing not.

    So why should I be upgrading again?

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: So why should I be upgrading again?

      because your current phone won't work on 5G network, that's why. We do apologize for the inconvenience caused, etc., etc. And if you think I'm wrong, well, here's a perfectly capable phone or two, nah, make it three (pun not intendeded, by the way). None of them work on 3 UK, because, well, as above, 2G = NOON (not on our network)

      1. Charlie Clark Silver badge
        Facepalm

        Re: So why should I be upgrading again?

        because your current phone won't work on 5G network, that's why.

        Since when? 5G is marketing term defined solely on the speed of the network. Technically it's a collection of further improvements on LTE, you know, Long Term Evolution. No one has the money for a new and incompatbile network (think Sprint's WiMax adventure) that no one will bother to use. 5G's main benefit will be to improve coverage and serve all the machines will need a connection for all the data they collect.

        1. ARGO

          Re: So why should I be upgrading again?

          "5G is marketing term defined solely on the speed of the network. "

          Correct from an ITU point of view. But in this context it's referring to 3GPP standards, specifically R15 and R16.

          Your current phone wont work as in the new standards (a) the air interface has completely changed ("5G New Radio") and (b) 5G networks will be deployed in spectral bands that current phones don't support.

          (There's also (c) core protocols have changed, but a commercial 5G core is some way off so don't need to worry about that yet.)

    2. big_D Silver badge

      Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

      The cases for 5G I've read so far are super fast bandwidth, with little latency, which will make "cloud" as fast as local access on SSDs... Dream on.

      The biggest drawback is range. Being such high frequency, the signal will have problems with buildings and will have a dramatically shorter range...

      LTE can go up over 1gbps speeds, but most operators are not offering anything over 350mbps. My "budget" contract gives me 10GB volume at 50mbps. Fast enough for what I need - plus the fact half the time I only get an Edge connection anyway.

      1. joed

        Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

        I'd add price to drawbacks - expensive to start with, limited coverage and will make data caps much more obvious (where service is available). I can only guess that the same consumers that wised up to longer phone upgrade cycle and switched to SIM only plans (often payg) are just as willing to burn their cash on high speed Internet at home and on the go (easily 2k$ over the year period). Basics like email/messaging, maps etc do not require anything over reliable 3G.

        Though if it can be written off as business expense, why not (just pity the customer).

    3. Aitor 1

      Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

      I got a 4G phone because my company (three) was giving less priority to packets coming from 3G devices to make 4G look better.. and the other companies were doing the same.

      The problem was that they could not route all the data in the core.. nothing to do with 3G whatsoever.

      As for 4G.. again the problem wont be from post to mobile phone. It will either be the connection to the post or the data center, except very specific places (like some parts of london, stadiums, etc).

      5G is better than 4g, but what we need is better networks.

      1. ARGO

        Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

        "my company (three) was giving less priority to packets coming from 3G devices to make 4G look better"

        That's unlikely to be a deliberate policy: 3G and 4G cores are separate entities. As are 3G and 4G spectrum on most networks. For UK networks its the spectrum rather than the core that limits your throughput. Unfortunately the speed goes down as the number of customers goes up.

        In the early days of 4G you could have a whole mast to yourself, or share a 3G mast with a few hundred other users. I could quite easily get 70Mbps download on my local mast 5 years ago; today that's down to 20Mbps because of all the 4G phones shipped in the meantime. I know of a few places where 3G is now faster than 4G. But the networks will fix that soon - they're refarming spectrum from 3G to 4G!

        Early implementations of 5G are likely to reuse the 4G core. But you'll still see a big boost in throughput as there will be a lot of new spectrum deployed. Remains to be seen if that's enough to justify a new phone though!

    4. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

      Because 4G was such a big draw over 3G?

      I'm still on 3G because my provider doesn't do LTE. Apart from the increasingly obese "single page apps" that developers seem so keen on, I don't really notice the difference.

    5. werdsmith Silver badge

      Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

      Can anyone actually remember the difference between 3G and 4G? I mean maybe its a little bit faster. Dont know, cant say I've particularly noticed. My phone says I'm using 4G at the moment. I cant say I've noticed any "killer" differences between the two.

      It's different when you tether a less portable device and use it accordingly.

    6. Nate Amsden

      Re: really? 5G as the big draw?

      Doesn't help that many phones and/or carriers blur the 4G line. On AT&T for example 4G is (as far as I know) 3G HSPA+, so when my phone says 4G, it is actually 3G. Only when it says 4G with a tiny little "LTE" next to it, is it actually running on 4G. Which again speed wise 95% of the time is no different from HSPA+ for me.

  2. naive

    Keep on dreaming

    About being able to place ones phone in an industry standard cradle, and use it as a Chrome/Windows device with a keyboard, mouse and screen. But who wants a standard anyway these days ?.

    1. Dave 126 Silver badge

      Re: Keep on dreaming

      Most phones that support wireless charging support use the same flavour of tech these days.

      Failing that, USB C offers power plus video out plus USB peripherals.

      Not sure why you want to run Windows/Chrome from your phone... maybe you're best off getting a headless fag-packet sized computer, either ARM or Intel ('Compute Stick'). Either way, they cost less than a midrange phone.

      Samsung DEX offers a desktop environment with some mouse and keyboard optimised Android apps, including a browser and Office 365. The docking hardware is standard (it works for other USB C devices such as laptops and Nintendo Switch). A review and discussion of the setup is on the Reg. 3rd party docks are £20.

      1. JohnFen

        Re: Keep on dreaming

        "maybe you're best off getting a headless fag-packet sized computer"

        I've been putting a lot of thought into what I'm going to replace my current smartphone with. I think I'll have to within the next year or two.

        The problem is this -- I use my smartphone more as a portable computer than a phone, but every new generation of phone in this class is worse than the one that came before (no headphone jack, no replaceable battery, no SD card slot, etc.). Very few of them actually meet my needs anymore, and it doesn't look like this situation is likely to change.

        So, I've been seriously considering the exact thing you recommend here -- buying a low-end phone that can serve as a hotspot, and carrying an actual pocket computer to do everything not phone-related.

        I find it a bit sad that we're reverting to the days when it was necessary to carry multiple devices. The big win with smartphones was that it eliminated that problem. But, here we are.

  3. TonyJ

    Another "no shit Sherlock" moment.

    I have an S7 Edge. It was bought by my family as a Christmas present a couple of Christmases back.

    Prior to that, the last handset I personally paid for was a One Plus 2.

    In fairness the S7 offered some useful features over the OP2 - wireless charging, being able to actually share a wifi connection and water proofing to name a few but I don't know if it'd justify the price differential if I were paying for it myself, outright.

    To pay closer to a grand for the latest generation that effectively offers NOTHING over this except the ability to burn through data plans much sooner...yeah sure. Can't wait to do that. Not.

    Nor, surprisingly do most other people want to.

    1. Hans 1
      Unhappy

      To pay closer to a grand for the latest generation that effectively offers NOTHING over this except the ability to burn through data plans much sooner...yeah sure. Can't wait to do that. Not.

      Son (teen) here has a 100Gb/month plan (like wife, two daughters and I have) and HE somehow burns through that in a fortnight .... I am not sure how that is even possible ... it gets slowed-down after that (3G speeds), so not thaaaat bad, but still ...what are you doing? He just says, "I use my phone ... like ... constantly" and I am not sure what that means, I do not download two Windows Server ISO's every single day!!!!

      He has a refurbished S7, after destroying three phones (LG 4 stylus, no-name Android, iPhone 5S) ... I think I'll give him my Nokia 3310, still works, though not sure about the battery and he will need an old sim ...

      1. juice

        > Son (teen) here has a 100Gb/month plan (like wife, two daughters and I have) and HE somehow burns through that in a fortnight

        7GB a day is fairly impressive, but it's fairly easy to burn through data if you're using Youtube (or similar) as a music player. Equally (IIRC), Google Play defaults to app updates OTA and Youtube will merrily switch over to data if you wander out of wifi range when uploading a video. I've caned my data limit a few times due to this!

      2. matchbx
        Facepalm

        There's only one thing that I know of that would cause a teenage boy to burn through that much data that fast.....

        PORN.

      3. MachDiamond Silver badge

        "Son (teen) here has a 100Gb/month plan (like wife, two daughters and I have) and HE somehow burns through that in a fortnight .... I am not sure how that is even possible ."

        Have his neck x-rayed and see if the "looking down at phone" posture is permanent yet.

        You are seeing a clear indication that your son has disconnected from the real world and is living electronically. If you don't fix that soon, you will be supporting them at your home for the rest of your life since he will have absolutely no social skills, manners and therefore, job prospects.

      4. peterm3

        Reminds me of my friend who used to get bought a replacement for everything he broke as a teenager. The expensive SLR for his photography college work he dropped and got a new one, he wrote off his parent's car and was bought his own one. He wrote that off and was bought another one. He then wrapped it round a tree. It stopped then as he was lucky to come out unharmed.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I wonder if the drop in income due to the enforced free EU roaming has upset the business models for some of the traditional suppliers?

    A few weeks ago I was looking into replacing my 3-year-old phone which was running obsolete Android with no official upgrade. In the past my (French) provider had offered a reasonable upgrade price in return for another 12-month contract. Not this time, they have not only increased my monthly sub again (by a total of ~50% over the 3 years) but they wanted hundred of euros for an upgrade to a mid-range phone. Ludicrously they wanted 429 euros to upgrade to a phone that I could buy SIM-free from Amazon for 330 euros.

    Some shopping around turned up a SIM-only monthly deal with free calls to landlines in 35-odd countries, including the US/Canada (and free roaming when in them all as well) and with a substantially larger data allowance. I got a special price for the first year, and will pay 50% less than I'm paying now per month after that. That let me buy an unlocked dual-SIM phone for almost no additional cost over the year.

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      I wonder if the drop in income due to the enforced free EU roaming has upset the business models for some of the traditional suppliers

      Virtually none except for some very popular holiday destinations (Spain, Greece): ARPA has been on a slow downwards trend for years. The existing networks have been built and amorticised. We're just looking at a mature market.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        French finance magazines estimate that losing roaming income will cost EU telcos between €1.2bn and €4bn a year which they have to get back somehow. Current assumption is that they will increase low-end monthly subscriptions, and roaming charges to/from non-EU destinations.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          French finance magazines estimate that losing roaming income will cost EU telcos between €1.2bn and €4bn a year which they have to get back somehow.

          I'm sure they would like to get that "lost" money back, but let's be clear that wasn't an honest return based on consumer choice and recover of capital investment, it was opportunist profiteering, based on lack of choice and lack of consumer protection. They most certainly haven't lost anything they are justifiably entitled to or "have" to commercially cover, so if they want that extra money, they are individually able to try raising prices and we'll see how that goes.

          I think most of the big mobile incumbent players have been doing exactly that strategy of trying to increase prices to raise margins. As a result I've been moving the family phones to a range of MVNO SIM only deals, but as in any market (energy, insurance, broadband, telecoms etc) the "sticky" customers who choose not to move are the ones who will be generating nice healthy margins for the large companies.

        2. Charlie Clark Silver badge

          French finance magazines estimate that losing roaming income will cost EU telcos between €1.2bn and €4bn a year which they have to get back somehow.

          € 1.2 bn/year across the whole EU is small; the loss of revenue to OTT services is (SMS to WhatsApp) is much higher.

          They ramped up charges to non-EU destinations years ago. What they will do is reduce the number of shops selling phones to reflect falling demand. This will do more for the bottom line than any notional loss of profiteering. But I fully expect them to hold out their hands for subsidies or "less onerous" regulation: if they could achieve a similar level of competition as in the US, I'm sure they'd be happy.

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            But I fully expect them to hold out their hands for subsidies or "less onerous" regulation

            Speaking of the UK telcos, how would it be possible to have less onerous regulation than Ofcom? Can you have "negative regulation"?

            1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

              Speaking of the UK telcos, how would it be possible to have less onerous regulation than Ofcom? Can you have "negative regulation"?

              How about the FCC?

        3. Hans 1
          Coffee/keyboard

          French finance magazines estimate that losing roaming income will cost EU telcos between €1.2bn and €4bn a year which they have to get back somehow.

          Yeah, sure ... where do you get that from ? daily fail or fox ?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Yeah, sure ... where do you get that from ? daily fail or fox ?

            capital.fr (1.2bn) and Le Figaro (4bn). I'd trust the Capital figure more, which is why I provided both.

          2. Charlie Clark Silver badge

            Yeah, sure ... where do you get that from ? daily fail or fox ?

            You can do it on the back of a fag packet: average roaming surchage per user per year. Around 400 million people in the EU so that's € 3 - €10 per user per year, pure profit split between two networks. Sounds about right and puts the number in perspective. Some networks in some countries (Spain, Greece) used to rely on inward roaming for up to 20% of their income but that was a long time ago.

            Still expect the networks to continue to hold their hands out for whatever's going. Along with the car makers for the hard work of simplifiying cars.

  5. Steve Evans

    Unless you're using your mobile to provide a hotspot for your home internet connection, I really can't see the need for any more speed on a mobile device.

    I can certainly see the case for them patching up the holes in the network that already exists... I see Edge on my phone daily, and in some instances where there is nothing at all.

    As for upgrading of phones, I recently upgraded after 3 years. What "must-have" feature did my phone lack?

    The ability to go for two hours away from a charger! The battery was screwed. Whilst I'm quite capable of replacing a battery, I couldn't find a source I trusted to supply a *real* genuine battery, and not just a low capacity fire risk.

    1. ravenviz Silver badge

      I couldn't find a source I trusted

      "I couldn't find an alternative to a very expensive OEM source I trusted"

      There, FTFY.

  6. James 51
    FAIL

    I might stick LineageOS on my S6 when ever I decide it's time for something new. I'd like a newer handset but between the expense and the slow feature creep (and outright spyware like bixby) why bother? External battery packs are taking care of that problem.

    When are the networks going to actually expand their coverage, improve indoor coverage and put in more backbone fibre?

    1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Just do it!

      Official LOS builds are rock solid and you can always install them on Sammys.

      1. Dave 126 Silver badge

        >you can always install them on Sammys.

        On both the Snapdragon and Exynos varieties of Sammy?

        1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

          For most of those there is no economically viable alternative to present whatever they want. It *is* indispensible to them.

          For the flagships, yes. All the phones have known variants and respective builds. It can be a little tricky initially to work it out but you soon learn the particular variant name. Always back up your important data in advance.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Why spend £1000 on a stupid phone with a stupid display, when a £350 phone like the BlackBerry Motion (or indeed any of the increasing number of good phones at this price point or less) actually does most of what most people want?

    Not saying a BB M is the best for everybody, but there's not a lot to complain about. And the screen doesn't burn in. And it never needs charging either, seemingly.

    1. James 51

      I'd opt for the key one but I still have my Q10 for everything that I would use it for.

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      "Why spend £1000 on a stupid phone with a stupid display, when a £350 phone like the BlackBerry Motion [..] actually does most of what most people want?"

      Because a £350 phone doesn't send out the message that you're the sort of person that can afford- or rather, is prepared- to spend £1000 on a shiny status symbol with a silly notch at the top.

  8. Pascal Monett Silver badge
    Thumb Down

    So, this year Europe will have a 0.2% increase

    Despite the fact that the last two years have seen decrease, and the US market is scheduled to decrease as well.

    Seems to me that the crystal ball is particularly cloudy - as usual.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: So, this year Europe will have a 0.2% increase

      Seems to me that the crystal ball is particularly cloudy - as usual.

      Well, any forecast is just a bunch of made up numbers. In the case of third party market analysis, the publisher only makes money be selling licences for the content, so the most important thing is to produce a few exciting sounding* snippets, that way they get free publicity as in this article, and then anybody with a suitable budget and potential interest thinks "I'd better have a read of that".

      * Arguably you can't have anything which is both exciting and within the scope of the research for mobile phone sales volume forecasting, but you get my drift.

  9. Big_Boomer Silver badge

    The problem is that for years their business model and profits have been based on regular replacements of handsets, but the changes from one generation to the next are now negligible and only "necessary" if you are one of those people who just has to have the latest thing. Last year I could have afforded a £1000 top spec phone, but chose a £300 phone that does 95% of what the flagship phones do. I can live without cordless charging, waterproofing and stupid gimmicks like the animated turds. I don't want to stream video all day every day (THAT's how your son uses 100Gb data in 2 weeks!) and I certainly don't want to spend £30 per month any more for a service that is quite frankly poor on all of the UKs networks.

  10. ashton

    Good, maybe memory will get cheaper.

    1. Dave 126 Silver badge

      How so? Global sales of smartphones are still increasing, albeit slowly. And of the smartphones still being sold in Europe, who's to say they don't have more storage on board than equivilent models a year ago?

  11. The Nazz

    Operators recently dug deep? Yeah, sure.

    Quick arithmetic, roughly £1.1bn deep.

    Wasn't it back in the late 90's spectrum auction when the sum raised was in the region of £23bn?

    And pray tell, Gordon "i'm a genius" Brown, wtf did you piss away all of that ( and more) on?

  12. juice

    Price vs demand...

    I suspect the mobile phone market is hitting the same issues as the PC, laptop and tablet markets: the market is saturated, improvements are increasingly iterative rather than revolutionary, competition has sliced away at the profit margins, and there's a sizable second-user market. Worse, while Moore's law reduced the cost of PCs and laptops, mobile phones have actually increased in price as more features have been packed in.

    E.g. Using Samsung and Apple as easy examples, the launch price for their base Galaxy/iPhone models were:

    2012 - S3: £500. iPhone 5 (16gb): £529

    2013 - S4: £579. iPhone 5c: £549

    2014 - S5: £600. iPhone 6: £619

    2015 - S6: £600. iPhone 6 plus (16gb): £619

    2016 - S7: £569. iPhone 6s plus (16gb): £619

    2017 - S8: £689. iPhone 7 plus: £719

    2018 - S9: £739. iPhone 8 plus: £799

    There's a few caveats - e.g. these numbers are from a basic Google search and the price of android handsets tends to drop fairly quickly after launch. Still, it does indicate that the base handset cost significantly increased from 2017 onwards.

    Admittedly, most people tend to buy a new handset on a contract, but even there, the monthly cost has risen. E.g the article I pulled the S3 pricing[*] from stated that contracts would be between £34 - £46 a month - and most of these contracts didn't have any upfront charges.

    Meanwhile, for the S9, the cheapest monthly contract at carphone warehouse is £48 - and that's with £100 paid upfront!

    (though to play devil's advocate: you get a lot more bang for your buck these days, and if you factor in inflation, that £34 in 2012 is roughly equivalent to £40 in 2018. Still cheaper, though!)

    Equally, if you're happy with a non-flagship handset, there's much cheaper options that are Good Enough for most people. E.g. the HTC One A9S is just £16 on contract with no upfront cost, and it comes with a 5-inch 720p screen, a 13mp camera, 3gb of ram and a octo-core 1.8ghz processor.

    [*] https://www.cnet.com/news/samsung-galaxy-s3-uk-price-and-release-date/

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