Kyocera to introduce 1.2 megapixel camera phone in U.S. next year

An article in SanDiego.com says Kyocera Wireless next year will offer a 1.2 megapixel camera phone with a flash and zoom in the United States. Currently, Kyocera offers only an attachable camera for $79.99 for its 7135 phone that uses the Palm OS.

External cameras will die a quick death, I believe, and good riddance. You can get a built in camera without sacrificing size or weight, and the cost to include an internal camera is very modest. There's no need for an attachable camera.

Indeed, carrying another device -- a camera -- defeats the value of a camera + phone device.

If you're thinking about buying a camera phone, my recommendation is buy one with an internal camera. As for paying $79.99 for an external camera? Overpriced -- and that price is supposedly $20 less than retail.

Camera phone statistics

If you've been reading this Weblog, most of the article by Larry M. Edwards won't be new to you -- in part because not only am I quoted, but also a fair amount of the unattributed information (though certainly not most) is from me! There are some forecasts you might find interesting, although I always take predictions with a very, very large grain of salt.

The article says, "Sales of camera phones will exceed the 'combined total sales of regular digital cameras and those using film' by mid-2004, according to a report by consulting firm Future Image. This includes phones with embedded cameras as well as phones with camera attachments.

"Telecommunications analyst The Yankee Group predicts that more than half of all cell phones will contain built-in cameras by 2007, compared to less than 2 percent in 2002. Consulting firm Strategy Analytics takes a slightly more conservative stance, predicting that 30 to 40 percent of cell phones will have cameras by 2007.

"Market research firm Gartner forecasts 66 percent of mobile phones sold in Western Europe will offer an embedded camera feature by 2006, compared to 9 percent in 2003. Clip-on cameras will go by the wayside and only be a small part of the market at 1.5 percent of sales in 2006, according to Gartner."

Coming in Part 2...

The article is the first of two parts. The second will be about moblog hosting company textamerica which is headquartered in Rancho Santa Fe, Calif., not far from San Diego.

Update: The second part is expected to be posted about 4:00 p.m. (PST) -- California time for those of you who are overseas.

Comments

[Alex]

Hi all!

[Craig Howitt]

Here in Japan 1.24 megapixel integrated cameras are already available. They cost about US$100. It is almost impossible to buy a phone here without photo and movie functions. Always wondered why they take so long to get to North America.

PS most phones that I've seen have an available English interface

[Alan A. Reiter]

Good points, Mike.

There needs to be a compelling reason to use an external camera attached to a cellular phone. If you could get a higher resolution camera or if your company banned camera phones, that could be a reason to get a handset with an attachable camera.

An external camera that could be attached to a phone without adding significantly to the size and weight could be useful. But the external cameras I've seen generally cost too much and offer a maximum of 640 x 480 resolution, so they're typically don't offer any advantages compared to an internal camera.

Of course if the non-camera functions of the cellular phone are attractive (like the hiptop) and the camera functionality is more of a nice-to-have rather than a must-have, some people might accept an external camera.

Technologically, integrating a higher resolution camera into a small handset isn't that difficult. But it will be interesting to see if a large number of corporations ban camera phones and whether that situation results in more external camera options than I would have assumed.

[Douglas Galbi]

I think it's important to differentiate between "eternal" cameras and camera phones with separate components so that a user can talk and look/share pictures at the same time. The latter are likely to be important to camera phone demand. See Section V in "Sense in Communication" at www.galbithink.org Headsets do that now, but they aren't designed with talking/viewing conversation flow in mind.

[mikepop]

The hiptop camera is external, and I do find that it deters me from taking pictures sometimes. The camera handily attaches to my keychain so I am rarely without it, but sometimes I am not motivated enough to take out the camera, AND the keychain, AND attach it, etc. Also, often there is no time for all those steps. While in Japan, my loaner camera phone had an integrated camera and I really noticed the difference in use. (Of course, it was the user interface slowing me down then, but that's another story).

On the plus side, with the increasing hysteria surrounding the camera phone as a tool of the pedophile and peeping tom, I'll be able to bring my phone to places where camera phones are banned. And, as cameras improve, I could (in theory) ditch my old camera and plug in a more powerful one.

Ideally, I'd like to see a camera that is removable, but is integrated into the phone design when inserted into the phone, so it could be left in the camera most of the time. (This would also let phone manufacturers offer the phone cheaper and the camera as accessory).