Music lovers in Japan can brace themselves to have the time of their lives! Apple Computer Inc. will be launching its Japanese iTunes music store that will stock and offer a million tracks by Japanese and other international artists to iPod owners.
Invading rival Sony’s PSP through its better iPod sales, Apple now intends to consolidate its position further in the industry with this new venture in Japan, which is Sony’s native threshold.
Statistics confirmed that iPods had outshone Sony’s portable game and media consoles, i.e. the PSPs, in its sales as Apple sold about 6 million iPods in the last quarter whereas Sony managed a sizeable less amount of 2 million PSPs during the same time.
Chief executive of Apple Computer Inc., Steve Jobs expressed his excitement at the iTunes’ Japanese launch and anticipated it to succeed in Japan just as it had done in the US where it dominates a whopping 80% of legal music downloads.
Speaking of Apple’s unprecedented music success, its iPod has been selling like hot cakes globally, what with an impressive sale of 22 million iPods after its introduction in October 2001 and its iTunes music store sale of at least 500 million songs across 19 countries throughout the world.
Nevertheless, iPod commands only 36% of the digital music market in Japan despite its enormous 70% coverage of the worldwide market. Sony occupies around 22% of the Japanese music player market.
Meanwhile, Sony dismissed all claims that it had been overtaken by Apple, saying that its music download service, Mora, was not too expensive at 200 yen per song (average). Contrarily, Japanese iTunes plans to charge 90% of its songs at a reduced 150 yen for each song, with a merely 10% being charged at 200 yen/song.
In another significant development, strong digital music contender, Napster has revealed its strategy to arrange for an independent music download service of its own in Japan, in association with Tower Records, the CD shop.
Posted
on : Fri, 05 Aug 2005 11:20 GMT | Business News
By : Salim Patel
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