I thought I’d never see the day. Protectionist barrier will apparently come down.
Per the WSJ, the Korean Communications Commission says that the country’s unique “Wireless Internet Platform for Interoperability”, or WIPI, protocol doesn’t have to be the standard for cell phones in Korea. This means that LG, Samsung and Pantech’s stranglehold on the Korean cell phone industry may be coming to an end. This virtual monopoly means that Koreans pay among the highest cell phone prices in the world.
Most non-Korean manufacturers (with the notable exception of Motorola) didn’t want to bother with WIPI. Carriers hailed the move:
SK Telecom called the WIPI rule change “timely and appropriate.” KT Freetel Co., the second-largest cellphone service provider, said it hopes to sell Apple’s iPhone soon after the change.
LG and Samsung had “no comment.”
Nokia, which operates one of its biggest factories in Korea but, ironically, sells no phones there said:
“[Nokia] believes that any move towards open standards anywhere in the world is a good thing for all industry players and consumers.”
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Among the highest cell phone prices in the world? Are you kidding? 25 bucks a month, never more than 30, no matter how much I use it. Never pay to receive calls, no worries about all those ridiculous ‘packages’ that insidious MBA grads in north america come up with after their profs drill them with a bunch of dipshit ideas about relative value of each minute of call time over the course of a day. And a HUGE market in high-quality used phones, and ready access to repair services virtually anywhere, anytime. Shit, I already know this is one of the things that’s going to drive me up the wall when I move back to Canada, is the telecommunications. Right now I pay about $30 for all the broadband I can use, $25 for the cell and $5 for the landline. No deposits, and hookup fees were a pittance. Canada’s going to more than double that, and make everything more complicated with their ludicrously complicated service bundles.
This will be on my want list but I may still need a hack done if providers try to sell cripple-ware in Korea.
I agree completely with you “Linkd”. Canada is simply atrocious when it comes to their telecommunications and internet industry. I would sooner hand-write letters than to pay for internet service in Canada, where an ISP can kill ones bandwidth for any number of reasons and still charge big $$$ for it.
“Data plans” in Canada are simply outrageous. Also, I hate it when people from Korea keep calling me on my cell phone. That’s because I have to pay for the calls. I can put the bill in my company expense account, but I can’t help but feeling getting ripped off.
Linkd, how else can you fund your utopian society?
Linkd, they ARE among the highest cell phone prices in the world. The PHONES, not the service you pay monthly.
$1000+ for a cellphone? I’ll use my 4-year old out-of-date cell, thanks.
Who knows, I make make the move to upgrade to an iPhone when/if they get sold here. I’m long overdue for a new phone.
I think the “highest cell phone prices in the world” refers to the price of the phone itself and not the monthly charge for use. In the US the carriers often provide a deeply discounted phone to entice suckers. Wasn’t a few months ago that the Korean gov’t forbade Korean carriers from doing likewise?
Re: the headline — Samsung and LG don’t exactly have a monopoly in Korea. Made-in-Korea mobile phones enjoy a near-monopoly (HTC phones are made in Taiwan, but comprise a small sliver of the market) — but the made-in-Korea phones include Motorola (which has a significant market share), Pantech & Curitel, and maybe still VK Mobile (they filed for bankruptcy late in 2006 but I haven’t kept up on whether they still offer phones in the market).
seouldout,
They get around this by offering you deeply discounted phones (or sometimes free phones) if you switch telecom companies. But stay with the same company and want to buy new phone? Full price, sucker!
Ding Dong The Witch is dead. I’d quite like a Nokia E71. Think it would do well on SKT
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