V

arious smartphone brands eye Indonesia as a potential market in Southeast Asia with its huge telecommunication devices penetration.

“Telecommunication devices penetrations in Indonesia are remarkable,” Dell managing director for South Asia Andreas Diantoro said at the launch of Dell’s first tablet PC-smartphone Streak on Friday.

“That’s one of the reasons why we have chosen Indonesia to first launch Streak in Southeast Asia.”

He added Indonesia was the fifth country to launch Streak after its debut in the UK four months ago.

Streak, claimed to be a tablet PC due to its 5-inch monitor size, also has the ability to make phone calls. The newly launched device is also embedded with a Google-based Android operating system as well as high-definition video, an anti-scratch screen and camera.

Andreas said there had been 1,100 Streaks pre-ordered at a rate of 80 orders daily. “We have prepared 10,000 units of Streak for the next three weeks,” he said.

The phone is offered between Rp 6 million (US672) and Rp 6.25 million.

Andreas was also optimistic on the new products saying that it was the only handheld device combining both tablet PC and smartphones.

“We cannot compete if we only sell a smartphone,” he said, adding that Indonesia had the potential for tablet PCs.

In addition to dual functions, he said Android was also one of Streak’s strength point saying that applications using Android had reached 160,000 apps with a growth of 10,000 to 20,000 apps per months.

Besides Dell, another brand which currently is grabbing a huge market in Indonesia is the BlackBerry by Research In Motion (RIM).

According to the International Data Corporation (IDC), the shipment of BlackBerries to Indonesia grew by 79 percent year-on-year in the second quarter of this year.

The IDC forecast that BlackBerry shipments to Indonesia will grow by 56.6 percent in 2010 compared to the same period last year.

In response to its sharp increase of sales in Indonesia, RIM Southeast Asia managing director Gregory Wade had said earlier that a branch office would be set up here to cope with the sharp sales increase in the country, and to develop more locally based BlackBerry applications.

IDC Indonesia’s senior market analyst Rizki Muhamad Ridwan said 2010 was the momentum for smartphone growth with nation sales predicted to touch 1,100,000 units by the end of the year.

“This year’s sale has increased by 20 percent from 700,000 units of sales last year,” he said over the phone, adding that smartphones would continue to grow positively in 2011, without further elaborating.

In his forecast, Rizki said that the BlackBerry would soon take over the market replacing market leader in smartphone, Nokia.

“Smartphones with Android will also grow positively in Indonesia next year,” he said, adding that the growth was supported by Indonesians’ eagerness to learn the touch screen smartphones.

Rizki said that Nokia currently still dominated the market with the BlackBerry sitting in second place followed by Samsung, Sony Ericsson and LG respectively. (map)