Panasonic is no longer playing the U.S. cellphone market, and stops selling its handsets to the customers because it can’t find a carrier who wants to join them in a partnership. Sad news, because a lot of technical goodies have been produced by Panasonic already, and the near-future releases are very promising too.
EnGadget goes a little deeper on this story.
“(…) for better or for worse, you can’t sell a significant number of phones in this country unless you’ve got a partnership with a major carrier (they’re the real customers, not us). Panasonic used to have a little something going on with AT&T Wireless, but the merger with Cingular left them out in the cold, with the new mega-carrier opting not to continue buying handsets from them.”
The sad thing is: even though you are a worldwide known and respected brand with millions of satisfied customers, if you can’t make a deal with a local reseller, you don’t have access to the local market that reseller is playing. That puts a giant like Panasonic in very tight shoes, and makes the local resellers very powerful negotiators during business deals.
I must say I think it’s a bit dangerous that a big company with such a solid structure and highly estimated trade value can so easily be outplayed and be forced to leave a market for what it is, to go and pursue business elsewhere. It says a lot about the current economic atmosphere, and the vulnerability of it.
Click here to read the full article on EnGadget.