Percentage of Sony Mobile Device Web Traffic in 2013 and 2014
The BBC recently reported that Sony has stated that the struggling mobile business relates to their predictions for increased losses. In this Chart of the Week we will look at the general distribution of Internet traffic originating from Sony mobiles per country and examine several significant markets for Sony. Data represents devices used to access the Internet and not the actual device volume figures.
Top 15 Countries For Sony
UK
In the UK Sony has currently the 3rd most popular brand of mobile devices used to access the Internet. What's more, Sony has overtaken RIM, HTC and Nokia in popularity since January 2013. Although 3rd place sounds good, there is a significant gap between Sony and the first two vendors: Samsung and Apple. In the same timeframe the amount of Sony devices used for Internet access has doubled from 1.5% in January 2013 to almost 4% in August 2014.
India
Sony has currently the 4th most popular brand of mobile devices used to access the Internet in India. This is one position higher than in January 2013 and data suggests that Sony managed to overtake Micromax which is leading in the pure sales figures, but the profits are slowly shifting from selling hardware to selling services and applications online. This is advantageous to Sony as data clearly indicates that Sony mobile phone users are more active when it comes to using the Internet. In August 2014 almost 7% of total mobile traffic originated from Sony devices which is almost twice as much compared to 3% in January 2013.
Japan
Since January 2013 Sony has gained 3 positions and is now the 3rd most popular brand of mobile devices used to access the Internet in Japan. At the same time Sony's share of total mobile web traffic decreased from 5.3% in January 2013 to only 4.45% in August 2014.
United States
Sony is currently the 13th most popular brand of mobile devices used to access the Internet in the US. Currently the US market share is 0.32% and has only increased by 0.15% since January 2013. Currently only about 0.3% of all mobile devices in the US used for internet access are manufactured by Sony. This number has doubled since January 2013. For a US market even a sub-percent figure could still translate into a decent volume due to the size of the market.
Top 3 Sony Devices
The most popular device is currently Sony Xperia Z (C6603) and constitutes 11.75% of the entire Sony mobile device population used to access the Internet. Second most popular device is Sony Xperia Z1 (C6903) with 11.27%. Both phones have passed the peak of their popularity and their percentages have been steadily decreasing. Sony Xperia Z2 (D6503) released in March 2014 is quickly catching up to the leaders. In August 2014 it had a share of 7% of all Sony phones used for Internet access.
Is Sony Struggling?
Yes. Based on the above data it certainly looks like Sony is indeed struggling to acquire the market share on most of the markets with local brands posing a serious threat. Sony, however managed to build up on the success of Xperia Z as planned. Xperia Z phones now account for nearly a third of Sony devices used for Internet access.