Sony Ericsson Sees Opportunity in Mobile TV

Excerpt from our Wall Street Breakfast, a one-page summary of this morning's key market-moving and stock-moving stories:

Ericsson to Expand Ties with Sony to Mobile TV: Official [Reuters]

Summary: According to Per Nordlof, Ericsson's director of product strategy and portfolio management, Sony and Ericsson are set to expand their venture to mobile and broadband TV. Nordlof commented, "We see a mass market for mobile TV within two years." He expects 30% of cell phone users to regularly watch TV on their phones. The Sony Ericsson JV has enjoyed success and reported its strongest earnings ever last quarter. Nordlof acknowledged the JV's confidence and said, "... we will work to develop software that connects the gadgets in the homes with the outer world."
Related links: Media coverage: Seattle PI. Commentary: Nokia: 'The Future of TV Will Be Personal' • Report: Apple Developing iChat Smartphone. Conference call transcripts: Ericsson Q3'06,Sony F2Q'06.
Potentially impacted stocks and ETFs: LM Ericsson Telephone (ERIC), Sony (SNE) • Competitors: Motorola (MOT), Nokia (NOK), Apple (AAPL) • ETF: Wireless HOLDRs (WMH)

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Comments

[carleast:]

I'm not quite sure where they conduct these market research surveys or whether the people doing them are given all of the facts but to me 30% of people watching mobile tv is absolute nonsense. Tell me. How many people with a video ipod regularly watch tv on that? 30%? I doubt it and that's even with a much better screen than you're going to get on a phone.

Maybe they are misleading us with regards "regularly watch tv on their mobiles". Maybe that means people will pay to watch sports highlights while having a drink in a bar. The thing is when will people have the time to watch tv on their mobile?

At home? Err, maybe your normal tv will be a bit better than that.
At work? Do some work!!!
While walking from A to B? Accident waiting to happen.
While driving? See above.
While in a bar? Do you have no friends?

I'm really struggling to imagine when we're going to watch tv on our mobiles. On the toilet? Great idea but hardly a deal breaker. While waiting in a queue? While on a bus? In fact that's probably the only time you would happily use it. When on transport that you're not driving yourself. The problem is that not everyone regularly uses public transport.

My prediction is that tv on the mobile itself will be restricted to sports highlights. But what may happen in the future is that mobiles may be powerful enough to stream tv allowing you to connect it to a normal tv. No need for cable or sky tv if that happens.

2006 Nov 24 10:10 AM

[Steven Towns:]

Carl, good points and appreciate your thoughts on this. I agree with you on the doubt about 30%. However, I think one way of interpreting the figure is to mean 30% of the users who have a mobile TV enabled/capable phone. Maybe that's how he should have expressed it.

2006 Nov 24 10:50 AM

[Steven Towns:]

I want to add that it's better to think more globally when evaluating Sony Ericsson's mobile TV plans. For instance, in Japan and South Korea, cell phones are more a part of daily life than for most users in the U.S. and don't forget the millions who live near major cities relying mostly on mass-transit. I'd venture to say a similar situation exists in Europe near/around urban areas.

2006 Nov 25 03:52 PM