Walkman clinches top spot in Japanese PMP sales

Marketing research firm BCN conducted a survey on the sales of Portable media players in Japan last week and it appears that the Walkman is back on top after 4 years of ipod reign. Unfortunately the margin is slim, 43% for the Walkman and 42.1% for the ipod. Link to the article after break.

Article from Yahoo News

The article mentions the iphone was not included in the survey and Engadget pomders why the iphone was not included, this of course would tip the favour for apple. But the iphone is a phone first and a PMP second therefore it should not be counted in the survey. Sales of Sony Ericsson walkman phone were not included in the survey, therefore neither should the iphone. Sony readjusted its sales forecast of PMPs from 6.3 million to 6.7 million for the year ending in March 2010 which is a good sign for Sony but Apple is planning on launching new product on September 9th which might allow apple to regain top spot.

It does not appear that Sony will have anything else to debut this year, the new S and E are the only new players, with no A in sight. Who knows what CES 2010 will hold, it is still a long way off and any new models at the show may not go on sale until March or even April of 2010.

Bloomberg