US catches up with Western European 3G subscriber base: Comscore

comScore is reporting today that the US experienced an 80% growth in 3G subscriber base during the last 12 months ending June 2008. This growth equals 28.4% of US mobile subscribers versus 28.3% of the mobile subscriber base in UK, Germany, France, Spain and Italy combined. Now, this is great news for the US mobile network operators. However, to put it in perspective, the European numbers only take 5 countries into account. It leaves out major players like Russia and Finland, not to mention the Asian countries.

Vertu Signature: 3G luxury

Vertu, the luxury arm of Nokia, released the new Signature, a stylish candybar phone. It is the first time that Vertu has gone 3G with its Signature series. It operates on dual band WCDMA and quad band GSM with WLAN and VOIP support. It sports a 320 x 240 pixels QVGA OLED display and an innovative SIM drawer to exchange SIM cards for international travel. No word on the pricing or release date but you can be sure it is going to be pricey.

Should businesses care about iPhone?

With the much ballyhooed announcement of iPhone 3G at $199 starting price, it is going to sell fast like its previous version, when it is released on July 11. However, should businesses care about iPhone? After all, iPhone still accounts for only 6 million of 3billion+ phones worldwide.

With its Exchange support, MS Word, Excel & read-only PowerPoint support, and IT-focused security features, Apple is taking on both RIM Blackberry and Microsoft Mobile. With the new applications store and the rich revenue sharing model for developers, it has opened up a whole new world of possibilities. However, there are still some features that would make it a compelling case for businesses.

First being option of carriers. Granted AT&T is trying very hard to improve its customer service and take care of Apple customers, however, Ma Bell will have to do better to convince businesses to switch carriers just so that they can use iPhone.

Second, of course is the price. Apple did go ways in reducing the price barrier which Steve Jobs said was the number one barrier to adoption of iPhone. But, businesses look for volume discounts for both handsets and calling plans. It appears that AT&T has increased its data plan, while keeping the voice plan same for iPhones. This $10 per month increase combined with no volume discounts on handsets could be a deal-killer for businesses contemplating adopting iPhones.

In spite of these, businesses need to give iPhone the second look it deserves.