Unlocking the unlocked cell phone market

The Sony Ericsson W995a is packed with features, but at about $600 it may not provoke much of a clamoring among U.S. consumers.
(Credit: Sony Ericsson)

Nokia and Sony Ericsson are targeting the U.S. with a new set of unlocked phones. But without hefty carrier subsidies, will they ever be able to crack the U.S. market?There's no question that when it comes to features, Nokia and Sony Ericsson's new U.S.-ready phones can easily compete against the hottest new phones on the market.Nokia's N97, a touch screen phone that supports both 3G and Wi-Fi, has a 5-megapixel camera and 32GB of memory. It's a clear competitor to the new Apple iPhone 3G S and the Palm Pre.

The Sony Ericsson W995a, also a 3G and Wi-Fi enabled phone, comes with an 8.1-megapixel camera, a brilliant display screen, a good media player and features such as stereo Bluetooth, and GPS. In terms of features and functionality, this phone could easily compete with other high-end feature phones like the LG enV3, which is sold by Verizon Wireless or the Samsung Memoir T929, sold for T-Mobile USA's network.

But even though these phones may have the features to compete, they're not sold through a wireless operator, which means that they are not subsidized, making them too expensive for most mainstream customers. The N97's suggested retail price is $700, and Sony plans to start selling the W995a for $600.

Meanwhile AT&T charges $99 for the 8GB iPhone 3G, $199 for the 16GB iPhone 3GS, and $299 for the 32GB iPhone 3GS. In exchange for the subsidy, AT&T requires that customers sign a two-year service contract. The price of the service, which includes voice and data services, is a minimum of $70 per month. But regardless of whether a device is subsidized, users will have to purchase some kind of voice and/or data plan, depending on the type of device they buy.

"In the U.S. market, price is a huge factor in determining which phones people buy," said Will Stofego, an analyst with the market research firm IDC. "Why pay $500 or more for a phone when you can get an iPhone for $100? Of course you have to agree to the two-year service plan, but I think that's a trade-off most consumers are OK with."

Up until recently, unlocked phones--handsets that can be used on multiple carrier networks--were only available in "gray" markets where Americans bought phones from overseas. Now manufacturers are selling them on their Web sites, in their own retail stores, and through some big retail chains, such as Best Buy. Nokia has opened several retail stores in the U.S. And Sony Ericsson sells unlocked phones through Sony Electronic retail channels.

As part of their push to address the U.S. market, Nokia and Sony Ericsson are also making sure that the phones they sell in the U.S. operate in the frequency bands used by AT&T and T-Mobile, the two main GSM carriers in the U.S. While these operators have built GSM networks just like carriers in Europe and parts of Asia, not all GSM networks operate on the same frequency, which means that some unlocked GSM phones bought in Europe or Asia won't work in the U.S. on a GSM network.

Another benefit to buying a U.S.-friendly unlocked phone is that Sony Ericsson is now offering warranties for customers who buy their U.S. unlocked phones through a Sony retail channel. The company doesn't offer a warranty for phones designed for other countries and brought to the U.S. through the gray market.

Roadblocks for unlocked phones:

Despite these efforts to create a stronger retail presence for these unlocked phones, the market remains small. In the U.S., only about 5 percent of the phones sold each year are unlocked and available from somewhere other than a carrier. This differs greatly from other markets. Worldwide, unlocked phones account for about 50 percent of phones sold. In Asia, about 80 percent of cell phones are sold independently of a carrier. And in Europe, roughly 70 percent of cell phones are sold unlocked.

There are several reasons for this difference. For one, two of the four big nationwide U.S. cell phone operators in the U.S. use CDMA, which does not use SIM cards that can be interchanged between phones. Most of the world's cell phone carriers use GSM, which does allow for SIM cards. And because people buy unlocked phones in order to swap out SIM cards to use on other carrier networks, phones made by manufacturers such as Nokia and Sony Ericsson, which have concentrated efforts on developing GSM phones, can only be used on two of the big four nationwide wireless networks in the U.S.: AT&T and T-Mobile.

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