In the short time that multimedia cell phones have been for sale, there have been several claims that handset makers would become the dominant suppliers of MP3 players worldwide. Those claims sparked a great deal of debate in both the wireless industry and in the iPod-centric downloadable music world.

This free white paper aims to answer the question:

"Will cellular phones that can play music files cut into the market for portable music players?"

In-Stat's belief, briefly, is "not yet and probably not soon."

The white paper includes the following:

• Survey Data that Indicates Users Want Phones to be Primary Music Players and How the Portable Media Market Will be Affected by This Desire
• Analysis of Camera Phone Users As a Gauge
• Why Camera-Equipped Phones have not Significantly Eroded the Market for Digital Cameras
  • Execution/Quality

  • Ease-of-Use

  • Ecosystem Integration

• Evaluation of Music Playing Mobile Phones Regarding Execution/Quality, Ease-of-Use and Ecosystem Integration

• Data and Figures from a Recent In-Stat Consumer Survey Concerning the Following
  • MP3 Player Ownership and Purchase Intentions Within the Next Year

  • Intentions of MP3-Capable Phone and MP3 Player Purchasers

  • Potential Replacement of MP3 Players by MP3-Capable Phones

  • Satisfaction with Experience of MP3-capable Mobile Phone

Additional information

Related information regarding online and mobile music can be found in In-Stat’s comprehensive Downloadable and Mobile Music Package (#IN0603350CSTM). This bundled package includes three in-depth reports that offer market trend analysis, primary research, and forecast data about online music, mobile music, and MP3-capable cell phones.

Also see Consumers are Warming to Mobile Video and Multimedia (#IN0602910MCM) and Multimedia Handsets: Exciting Capabilities meet Dull Customer Demand (#IN0602921WH), which includes additional information about consumer attitudes toward multimedia handsets.