Sam in Japan: A Meeting with Sharp
Editorial by Samuel Chan on Thursday July 06, 2006.
 Sharp 905SH |
 Sharp 905SH |
 Sharp 905SH |
A lot of people would parallel phones made by Sharp with those of Sony Ericsson, in that they both have strong AV functions and they both have introduced the "it" models in the geek world. Now here's the punch-line. What if I tell you that Sharp was the company that first brought camera phones into the world? Well, I am talking about their J-SH04 model released back in November 2001. Which phone were you using back then? Did you even have a phone? Their claim to fame doesn't end there, either. Sharp is also the first manufacturer to put TFT screens, secondary color sub-displays, VGA displays, as well as megapixel and optical zoom camera modules in our favorite gadget.
In Japan, Sharp is much revered by phone fanatics. MobileBurn was lucky enough to chat with Hiroyuki Takahashi of Communication Systems and Hiromi Morita of PR division from Sharp.
Sharp by definition
The loudest voice that speaks of the Sharp brand, according to Takahashi, is that Sharp strives to answer and satisfy consumer needs. In other words, Sharp does not produce what Sharp wants, but what the market wants. Just a few lively examples around us: the Sharp 903 with improved optics that produces finer pictures than the Sharp 902; the Sharp 904 that revived the subdisplay and solved the image saving time issues that haunted the 903 sales; the introduction of Sharp 550 and 770 that answers the demand from mid-range consumers.
We know that Sharp is at the top in the business when it comes to delivering the highest technology to mobile phones, unlike how certain companies that just claim such things and put that into their motto like everybody. The reason lies in the structure of Sharp's mobile business, that Sharp itself has a components division that allows the company's one-of-a-kind technologies to be applied across a wide range of products. The AQUOS phone 905SH is an example. It is not just a claim but verified by a number of independent media reviews that the phone is able to deliver the best digital broadcasted pictures (One-Seg Service: ISDB-T) across all competing devices in the market today. Thanks to the AQUOS team.
 Sharp 905SH |
 Sharp 905SH |
Performance in Japan
Recently Sharp announced that they will be producing phones for AU KDDI, making it the only company in Japan to deliver mobile phones to all operators. Lately the company has been the fiercest in the market as it topped the 2005 phone shipments race in Japan (7.55 million units). "Our key is that we don't just compete, but we make sure that we produce what the market wants", according to Takahashi.
Of course there is no perfect company in the world. The increased development load has made schedules tighter and quality control ever so difficult. Cost-competitiveness is also an issue faced by Sharp, when they have to introduce the most expensive technologies as early as possible in order to continue their lead in market. Owing to that, Sharp has started a collaboration with Fujitsu, Mitsubishi, and others to develop middleware for FOMA handsets, and I guess this is going to be the trend in the future as more and more alliances form.
