New devices of December 2005. Russian market of mobile phones

Preparations for the New Year are carried out with great dispatch, and that means that distributors bring the maximum number of phones in and customers are waiting for discounts. And now it is not quite clear who will stand this unequal fight, stagnation of retail sales marked the beginning of December and changes for the better are expected only starting from the 20 of December. Against the background of customer's expectations of innovations, the makers do not hurry up to represent them; everything rests on grown delivery period and troubles with the customs. And that is why we have been watching advertisement of several new products on TV since November and still do not have them on the counters. Some "handbag"-sellers have already brought such devices and now sell twice or even four times more expensive than European retail prices. Speculator are quite lucky during a pre-holiday period, however, the volume of such sales is really insignificant, in contrast to several years ago.
Statistics.

Totally new models - 18

Alcatel - 2

LG - 4

Motorola - 3

Nokia - 2

Pantech - 2

Philips - 1

Samsung - 2

Voxtel - 2

How it looks. The structure of this material is extremely plain, the manufacturers are sorted in alphabetic order so that you could fast switch to the company interesting to you, just using the list on the top of the page. While describing a model, we give approximate price for the appearance time and the price after the first interest to a new device falls. One more parameter is the mark of the model. I'd like to stress specially - that is a subjective mark, which we form considering our idea of the new model, manufacturing company, invested or not invested in promotion sums. The mark can contain the following scale:

* Bestseller - a model standing out for eminent characteristics (that may be price, not only technical characteristics). You should point most of your attention to Bestseller models.
* Interesting variant. This is a device having above average characteristics, which has a raisin. As a rule, such models set the fashion in their price segments, they are mass oriented.
* Technology for technology. Niche products, which are interesting for technical solutions, not intended for mass audience. For instance, we can consider Nokia 7710. Taking into account the capabilities, the handset seems interesting, but the size and operating speed cross all advantages, making it niche.
* Gamer. A typical representative of its class. No special advantages or disadvantages. These are mass products, which form the main sales in their segments.
* Pretender. Phones of this category have not reached the Gamer class, however have some attractive traits (for instance, the price, but it can serve as a negative factor, then a Gamer turns into a Pretender), they may lack many functions standard for this or that class. As a rule, Pretenders are devices by the second and third echelon products or overpriced phones of main makers.
* Neither fish nor fowl. This category contains phones intended for everybody and nobody at the same time and from the very beginning. These phones possess with no eminent features, which makes them ones of the many others on the market.
* Dead. Phones that are very strange to appear on the market at all, as they attract nobody's attention. This category is very rare, so we won't abuse with it.

Besides evaluating the model's attraction, we will also provide the closest rivals for you to understand who it will compete with on the market.

We have a request to you. If you notice that this or that model is not included into the list, and you are sure it has not still appeared on the market, tell us about it in our forum. And in the section "Materials of site" you can discuss this article and suggest improvements for the format of the report. We would be grateful for your help in formation of monthly material. Thank you in advance.

Company list:

Alcatel
Asus
BenQ
Haier
LG
Motorola
Nokia
Pantech
Philips
Samsung
Siemens
Sony Ericsson
Voxtel

Alcatel

Alcatel OneTouch C552
Launch: 1 December (was planned for the 15 of October, logistics mistakes)
Price: 170-175 USD/120-125 USD
Mark: Pretender
Rivals: Siemens C65, Sony Ericsson K300, Motorola C650
Alcatel OneTouch C552

Such models as C551/C552 appear in the middle segment to replace Alcatel 556/557. The models are equipped with 32-tones polyphony; though support only AAC, but not MP3. The screen has the resolution of 128x160 pixels and shows up to 65K colours (STN). This screen type is good for its class; the colours are really vivid and look good. These are middle class models with a VGA camera, panoramic shoot mode, which also record video (and it can be assigned to a contact). The phones feature 3MB of memory and IrDA. The price is higher than for the rival phones.

Elle by Alcatel/ Alcatel C652 version
Launch: 15 December (at first the date was 25 October, postponed due to the logistics problems)
Price: 400-500 USD/300 USD
Mark: Neither fish nor fowl
Rivals: fashion solutions of this segment
Specification Alcatel OneTouch C652
Review Elle №1

The company of Alcatel played as a phone maker for a French magazine Elle, and the task was to create a glamour phone. It all resulted in a version of the C652 for Elle, which distinguished in colours (black and white) and design elements like headbands and so on. You shouldn't expect high functionality of the phone, as that is an exclusively design work, and the lion's share of the price falls on the appearance. Technically, the model remains behind the market for about two years, and thus is really of no interest.