October 15th, 2007
The iPhone impact: Treo, T-Mobile take biggest hit
Initial iPhone buyers were 10 times more likely to previously own Palm’s Treo. Early iPhone buyers were also three times more likely to previously own T-Mobile’s Sidekick, according to a report from the NPD Group.
NPD’s report is designed to gauge Apple’s impact on the mobile phone market. What’s bad news for Palm (related posts) and T-Mobile (related posts) is apparently good for Research in Motion, which has strong sales momentum. Blackberry users haven’t defected to the iPhone, says NPD. Why? “The iPhone’s lack of corporate email support appears to make it less appetizing to current Blackberry owners,” NPD analyst Ross Rubin in a statement.
NPD portrays the iPhone as the bridge between “feature phones” that are designed for content and games and smartphones for corporate types.
As for carriers, here’s how NPD sizes up the iPhone impact:
When it comes to carrier switching, Alltel and T-Mobile took the biggest hit from Apple and AT&T’s iPhone marketing juggernaut. Consumers who switched carriers to buy an iPhone were three times more likely to switch from Alltel or T-Mobile than from other carriers. Sprint and Verizon also lost customers to AT&T and the iPhone, but not nearly to the same degree, due to their existing over-the-air (OTA) music offerings, rich video and data services and 3G networks already in place.
NPD’s survey was based on surveys with more than 13,000 consumers.
Update: NPD wouldn’t provide the full report. In an interview Rubin gave a bit more color on the report. Here are the takeaways:
- Motorola was the third most impacted brand in NPD’s findings. Rubin says Motorola’s Q was probably traded in for the iPhone. The impact on Motorola was less than T-Mobile, but he didn’t have the statistics handy.
- The big differentiator for the iPhone is its rich media support and operating system. Rubin says media support was mentioned repeatedly in NPD’s survey. Apple most likely went for the heavy media focus since it had to combat devices that get subsidized by carriers.
- The survey was conducted via NPD’s MobileTrack Web site. It’s the first iPhone pulse NPD has taken.
Larry Dignan is Editor in Chief of ZDNet and Editorial Director of ZDNet sister site TechRepublic. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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