Custom «Nokia Vs iPhone» Essay Paper Sample

Abstract

This is a report on two major players in the cellphone industry; Nokia and iPhone. They are currently engaged in a tight competition, fighting for space in the cellphone market. On one hand, Apple Inc. has had tremendous success with the iPad, iPhone and iTunes App store. On the other hand, Nokia has become the highest selling mobile phone manufacturer by depending on Symbian Corporation for mobile operating systems, in addition to, OVI, for mobile based application software development and distribution (Martti, 12-35). The company produces mobile devices like CDMA, GSM, W-CDMA, and Internet services such as music, games, applications, media, maps and messaging. This report also compares the two in terms of profits made so far.    

Nokia Vs iPhone Competing

Nokia Corporation is responsible for the manufacture of mobile devices and converging Internet and communications industries. It is a Finnish multinational communications company and the largest mobile phone manufacturer in the world. The iPhone is an Internet and multimedia-enabled smartphones by Apple Inc. it can function as a camera phone, video camera with visual voicemail, text messaging, and a portable media player, in addition to, an Internet client with email, 3G and Wi-Fi connectivity. Its user interface device is a multi-touch screen with a virtual keyboard. It has numerous applications with various functions, including reference, games, social networking, GPS navigation and many more.

Nokia is among the largest cellphone makers in the world; however, they face stiff competition from Apple, who manufactures the iPhone. Apple has become the highest profitable company in the handset industry. Research has it that, the iPhone manufacturer overtook Nokia in the September quarter. Although Nokia seems to be loosing ground in the industry, by volume, it still remains to be the largest smartphone maker (Dan, 15).

When it comes to profits, it is evident that, iPhone is significantly making profits from their merchandise. On the other hand, Nokia seems to be facing a hard time keeping up with the competition. In its first-quarter earnings, Nokia fell short of what its executives expected in sales and profit. Analysts expected an estimate of about 9.69 billion euros; however, they got 9.52 billion, this is despite the fact that sales rose from the last quarter. They sold 21.5 million smartphones, though it is nothing when compared to the 130 percent jump iPhone reported.  

Nokia looks to be struggling to regain its former position in the mobile business. In estimates, the iPhone brought a profit of about $1.6 billion dollars in the third quarter, while Nokia made away with $1.1 billion. In just two years, Apple has successfully broken into the mobile phone industry with high wholesale prices, strong volumes and tight controls.

During the July-September quarter, 7.4 iPhones were sold by Apple, which translated to about $4.5 billion in sales. This competition all started in 2007 when the iPhone was first launched by Apple. It was among the few smartphones with numerous advanced features. Soon, the other manufacturers came out with other products to counter it, for example, Nokia came out with Nokia N95.

The problem with Nokia seems to arise from the fact that, they keep on delaying the release of their high-end smartphones. By pushing the launch date further, the company will be under pressure. Moreover, the corporation seems to have been hit hard by the economic downturn (Martti, 250). It still has a major share market, but, Apple is characterized by the high-end smartphone, high wholesale pricing, and lean operations.

In my own view, Nokia could begin improving their handset so as to keep up with the competition. The mobile phone giant needs to show more of what their devices are about. This is because they seem to be having a problem with marketing. The phones seem to be more complex when learning or using them. Moreover, they need to show how they work and tell its potential customers on the benefits of owning one. This is what its main rival, the iPhone, succeeded in. They broke all the existing barriers to become a pop culture icon in consumer electronics. Apple had an excellent marketing simplicity.

When Nokia launched its Nokia N8, they will face stiff competition, in Europe and the United States, from other smartphones like the iPhone 4. However, the cellphone has a chance of doing well in other areas like in Asia due to brand loyalty and lower price (Lee, 24).

In my view, Nokia's N8 has a good chance of keeping up with speed in the market. It has a good hardware when compared to the iPhone 4. The 12 megapixel N8 camera has a superior image quality and takes better videos. The two are the same in the size of the screen; however, Apple is better with its Retina Display technology. The iPhone also leads with over two million applications. Nokia is much cheaper and ahead in Video Calling, Flash support, HD recording and other entertainment features.  

Comparing Nokia N95 with iPhone 3G, the Nokia looks cool and easy to handle. However, it has a smaller screen size of about 2.6 inch, compared to 3.5 of the iPhone's. The N95 has a higher camera resolution of 5MP, while the iPhone has 2MP. On one hand, the iPhone has options for 8GB and 16 GB, but no expandable memory. On the other hand, the N95 has only 150 MB memory, but with a slot for an external memory.

In conclusion, with all these competition between smartphones dealing with features and huge processors, the cellphone market should be prepared for numerous other battles between these two companies in their quest to dominate the market. However, consumers are on the benefitting end, for they will choose whichever fits their description or lifestyle. These are a few areas, which can be used as reference points for making choices: connectivity, display, sound, camera, processors, battery life, and memory support.