Monday, March 5, 2007
Zune Holds 9.9% of Hard Drive-Based Market for January
Posted by Jason Dunn in "Zune Talk" @ 07:00 PM
"NPD numbers are out again, and in the harddrive MP3 player category, Zune has the number two spot, with 9.9% of the market in January. Also, the Zune Marketplace subscriptions user base grew by 60%, with individual ZMP downloads increasing by 65%. It's also worth noting that Zune is sold in more retail outlets than NPD currently reports on: for example, Amazon (which actually only accounts for a very small percentage of Zune sales), Wal-mart, the club stores - Costco and Sam's aren’t reported by NPD, and some others. NPD also doesn't report on the Apple Stores, where Zune isn't sold, (obviously ;). So the actual market share might be different, but to report on the category, we’ll stick with NPD."
It's interesting to see that the Zune is holding onto the #2 spot for hard drive-based players, denying that nay-sayers the ability to say that the numbers from the first month were a fluke. 9.9% is a good number for a brand new product, but it also underscores the fact that the Zune needs to get a flash version out into the market because the real big numbers come with the sale of the Nano, Shuffle, all of Sandisk's products, and others. I wonder, how well can the Zune team execute in parallel? With some markets, such as Canada and the UK, expected to get the Zune later this year, is the Zune team focused on that or will we see the US market get its first flash-based player before other places in the world get their first Zune at all?
It's interesting to see that the Zune is holding onto the #2 spot for hard drive-based players, denying that nay-sayers the ability to say that the numbers from the first month were a fluke. 9.9% is a good number for a brand new product, but it also underscores the fact that the Zune needs to get a flash version out into the market because the real big numbers come with the sale of the Nano, Shuffle, all of Sandisk's products, and others. I wonder, how well can the Zune team execute in parallel? With some markets, such as Canada and the UK, expected to get the Zune later this year, is the Zune team focused on that or will we see the US market get its first flash-based player before other places in the world get their first Zune at all?
