November 30, 2007
Music to Mobiles Causing Stir in Korea
With the imminent European release of Samsung's i450 music phone, the mobile music market is starting to get cutthroat, reports The Korea Times. But experts are warning that restrictive anti-piracy laws might hurt the emerging demand for mobile phones that double up as music players.
"... Nearly 80 percent of mobile phones sold in Korea have now integrated music players. Moreover, Korean mobile producers expect to announce the sale of over 10 million MP3-playing handsets in 2007, a total of five times more than the number of stand-alone music players' sales forecasted for the same period.
But the Korean mobile music industry goes way beyond just downloading songs. SK Telecom believes almost 45 percent of their subscribers have signed up to their "coloring'' service, which makes SK over 100 billion won a year.
SK also estimates wireless Internet and mobile data services make up around 40 percent of their total revenue.
The introduction of flat rate file music downloads is revolutionary, though, and it has proved to be an attractive one for customers. For only a relatively small fee, people are able to get as much music on their mobiles as they like. "
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