Are mobile users hankering for the numeric keypad? Survey says: perhaps.
Research conducted by Canalys in France, Germany and the UK said just 38 per cent of consumers want a finger-based touchscreen for their next handset, with 16 per cent opting for a stylus-based touchscreen.
It suggests some disillusionment with finger-controlled devices. Among vendors, HTC and Apple have a higher proportion of users wanting to stick with the same type of UI, while Sony Ericsson had the lowest proportion at 29 per cent.
The users with the least desire for finger-centric touchscreen products are those that use a stylus-based device, showing how current UI affects future choices.
"We are at a critical time in the mobile industry," commented Canalys VP Mike Welch. "The user awareness and interest is clearly there, and the opportunity to drive a mass change in user interaction, and hence device capabilities and the opening up of new application and service revenue streams, is tantalisingly close.
"But only if users continue to embrace these new UIs once they have tried them. This is the new arena in which mobile vendors must differentiate themselves, and the user experience battle will spread to other product categories, such as netbooks."
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