As we all know by now, HTC’s sales have taken a hit in the past year. The company has tried to improve its situation with the release of the HTC One series worldwide, and even with devices like the HTC EVO 4G LTE on Sprint, but in the face of competition from the likes of Samsung and Apple, sales still aren’t where they need to be.
The Wall Street Journal recently got its hands on an internal memo sent to HTC’s employee’s from the company’s CEO, Peter Chou. In it, Chou admits that there are “multiple areas” in the company that need to be fixed, and that “fast growth from the last two years has slowed us down.” In regards to HTC’s changing strategy, Chou wrote that “we agreed to do something, but we either didn’t do it, or executed it loosely.”
Still, Chou insists that HTC is in a great situation financially, and that HTC’s problem is only short term. However, Chou also asked his employees to “please make sure we kill bureaucracy.” How this will be implemented is anyone’s guess, but it got me wondering what you think HTC needs to do to turn itself around.
Several things come to mind immediately: first, HTC needs to make sure that it’s releasing updates in a timely manner for all its devices, for at least two years after the device is initially released. Maybe internal bureaucracy has stood in the way of this, and if so, hopefully we’ll start to see things improve.
HTC also needs to demonstrate that it’s listening to its users and giving them what they want. Admittedly, HTC has already started doing this, but it needs to do more.
But what else does HTC need to do? What would you like to see from the company in the near future? Sound off in the comments!
They need models with a larger battery. I was all set with the EVO 4G LTE, but with no removable back cover, I had no option of purchasing a larger battery, so I had to go with Samsung’s S3.
I know HTC talked at how they improved the battery life, but it’s maybe 10-20% improvoment where as I’m looking at more than doubling my battery life.
Samsung is also more generous (less cheap) with hardware by shipping with 2MB of RAM instead of 1MB on HTC.
As much as like the EVO brand, they should’ve twisted Sprint’s arm and gone with “One” brand. That way any carrier advertising for HTC helps HTC even of consumer buys one with another carrier.
I think they could really build a loyal following by releasing updates directly to customers and bypassing carriers which seem to take forever to push out updates.
The quality of their phones are actually very good. They just need to make a uniform body across all carriers like Samsung and Apple so accessory and peripheral makers will be happy to invest in creating products for them. These makers would in turn be advertising the HTC name for them, creating customer awareness. They also need to standardize their their port locations. Customers will be happy to invest in an HTC phone knowing that they could still use their existing peripherals. The One X is a beautiful and powerful phone. They just dropped the ball by not having it across all carriers, not having an SD slot, removable battery, and CAMERA BUTTON!!! (That’s the one feature that is keeping me from buying the Galaxy S3).
I think the easiest way is things such as releasing timely updates for the “normal” user.
Then, for the modders, they need to either release unlocked bootloaders (Doubt it), or that when you use HTCdev unlock, that it is actually completely unlocked.
Lastly, release the source codes in a timely manner. There is no point in releasing them when most of the users/modders already jumped ship to another phone.
If you make an image of yourself as an open carrier that responds to the users both, the casual and the modder, you will have, I believe, great sales.
How about a dedicated PlayStation peripheral that turns your HTC One series phone or the EVO into a true PSP. Why not actually use the partnership that they announced back at E3. Although with PlayStation sales( or lack there of) right now it may not boost much. But it couldn’t hurt. and by peripheral I mean a good quality controller with DUAL joysticks that attaches via the USB port and would have its own internal battery that would feed power to your phone while connected.
how about start with the simple!! they released the evo lte in black only…a month or two later u get a white one…wtf!! how about u give people the option in the beginning?? and keep innovating, htc!! tap in to what made the og evo great…it blew all other phones, at the time, away. it didn’t compete with other phones, it set the bar. they also need to “get in bed” with the developer community…this is a simple fix, and could help drive innovation…
Well said!
+1 on this… punishing your most loyal customers that pre-order?!?
If HTC doesn’t beat Samsung to Jelly Bean I can see them exiting all Android phone markets in bankruptcy. If Samsung can get the update through all carriers quickly they will have a huge selling point over HTC models and HTC will pretty much be done. I have the EVO LTE but had I been getting a new phone today and walked into a store and Sprint had the SGS3 with Jelly Bean there would be no question which phone I would be getting. Google Now and Jelly Bean is such as huge selling point and if I were HTC I would cancel all other projects until my hero line had it. But I think HTC is moving fast on Jelly Bean which is why all of their other legacy Ice Cream Sandwich updates have been delayed. HTC needs to move fast and push their Jelly Bean updates though the long carrier process quickly. HTC needs Jelly Bean first on their devices, to stay competitive and have the edge.
1. De-bloat Sense.
2. First to get Jelly Bean.
3. Bigger/Removal batteries.
4. PROFITS!!!!!!!!
They need to make the Nexus line.
This.
My thoughts, too!
When you end-of-life a product, release an open-ended driver for future support from the modder community.
Jelly bean works fairly well on my o.g. evo, but the various radios and cameras do not.
Instead of asking his employees to “please make sure we kill bureaucracy.” he should be killing Sense. One of these companies Samsung or HTC have to realize that Android 4.x no longer needs to have skinning and in fact stock Android is now the way to make yourself different.
I have really liked htc over the 2 years I had my O.G. evo 4g and my experience with since it has been pretty good but I think they need to update their bluetooth drivers so people could use third party controllers to play emulators right out of the box on a stock rom some people don’t really think this is a problem but it would be nice to have a phone that would also be a portable gaming system because everything is already there you have the hdmi out too hook up to your flat screen tv and the emulators are easily found on the market so if we just had a working updated bluetooth drivers we would be in business to play all of our favorite android games and emulators
I’ve really been thinking about switching to a samsung galaxy s 3 just because it doesn’t have sense and would make using third party controllers 4 emulators much easier
They need to cut Sense and go pure Android and get the OTAs out directly to the user. We should have had Jelly Bean on our devices by now, which would keep them ahead the competition.
I had really hoped their teaming with Beats would lead to some awesome Android docking stations and music accessories.. But all I see coming from Beats are iPhone products..
Also.. They need to keep on top of updates.. I’ve had the Evo 4G, 3D and LTE and sometimes it seems they drag their feet on getting updates and Android upgrade ready and pushed out
Get out of contracts with carriers that require them to lie to cover up the carrier’s activities.
These questions need to be asked in a forum other than this. It is joe and jane phone buyer that actually create all of the profits. Though the dev/modder/hacker/tweaker community may be the most vocal, we actually constitute quite a small portion of the general phone purchasing public (hence why the iphone is so popular). If they truly want to make profits they need to make their phones as simple to use a possible. Most people don’t even know which version of android their phone is currently running and could really care less as long as they can actually make it work for them. That said, if they could somehow get back the nexus brand that would go a long way with making the dev community happy. Overall I think if they hold true to their promise of making only a couple great devices per year, rather than 7 pieces of rubbish, they should be able to gain back a lot of the market share that they lost to samsung.
They need to put the charging back on the bottom of the phone ,they need a removable battery ,go on par with the other companys sgs3 has to 2gb of ram , the htc EVO line has shot its own in its leg ( plexico )
They need to have their flagship phone be the same form factor across carriers and be on most of the the carriers. It’s clearly what Samsung is pulling off right now and look a them! I know HTC wanted to do this for some time, you could tell by their press last year they were aiming to do very few phones, just great ones, and the idea behind the “One” brand is really just that. But I guess they didn’t have the muscle with the carriers, I mean the One X isn’t even on Verizon. What chance do you have not being on Verizon? It might have been cool if they could’ve used the Evo brand for themselves and not just for Sprint, they could just have the Evo everywhere and each year just call it the Evo (maybe designate by year 20120 Evo like cars do)… instead of 4G 3D LTE blah blah.
With Apple there’s really no debating which model to get. Same now with Samsung. HTC knows this too but I guess they just could’t achieve it yet.
Also, I don’t know anything about the guy, but the CEO seems a little out of it.
Personally I feel a strong brand loyalty to HTC and I find the new Evo to be perfect for me. So I can’t betray them, at least not this year.
HTC needs to be more proactive with updating their phones with the latest software/bug fixes and being more developers friendly as far as unlocking bootloaders and releasing source in a timely manner. Yes the developing community is the minority but it is growing larger and larger every day. It is starting to become a common thing for android users to root for some reason or another. Htc also needs to have more control over the update schedule and not let the carriers dictate when the updates get pushed. Carriers like sprint like to hold out on updates in hopes to get new and current customers to buy the latest and greatest with the most recent software. This kind of business practice is good for sprint or other carriers but not so much for HTC because they are already behind the ball with updates. This is the only thing I respect about apple, no carrier can tell apple that they can’t push out updates. All manufactures should should follow this philosophy, or does apple have a patent on that. Sorry had to say it. HTC also has to have more quality control in the manufacturing end. I personally went through 4 Lte’s before I got one without screen problems. I am not the only one that had to go through phone after phone just to get one that passed the grade, go to any developers site and you can see the masses that had problems. I do know that all manufactures have problems with quality control but if HTC took the bull by the horns and did something about it they could attract their lost customer base. I personally thought about saying screw the Evo Lte and going back to Samsung because I was tired of returning my defective phone. And last but not least HTC needs to do a major overhaul with the sense overlay or get rid of it entirely. I personally like sense BUT it slows the phone down entirely to much. I flashed CM10 the other night and couldn’t believe how fast it was, I had to go back to viper Rom because of the bugs but once it becomes a daily driver I will be saying goodbye to sense for the life of my phone.
@Robert
Have you checked out venom ROM??? Same guys that did viper and you can remove just about all of sense through the aroma installer portion of the flash. Its not AOSP but its fast and its stable.
Didn’t read thru all the replies… But I noticed a lot of you are looking at HTC’s problems from an enthusiast point of view. Let’s be clear here, releasing more/timely updates or even winning a bid for the Nexus line isn’t gonna do much for their bottom line. Those are things we, as geeks, care for deeply… But they aren’t things that will move a million more phones off the shelf. Samsung is simply beating everyone else over the head with superior marketing and by applying more leverage unto the carriers in order to release a unified product line. It didn’t happen overnight either, you can sink a lot of money into PR and still fail at it… But both those things are goals they’ve been working towards since the original Galaxy s. The average consumer doesn’t just have the Samsung name drilled into their minds at this point, it’s the Samsung Galaxy. Seems silly but it makes a huge difference. I’m a big HTC fan and I even like their TV commercials, but they’re still years behind as far as marketing their brand overall.
ill sum it up,
-better batter life
-removable battery
-unlocked bootloader from factory
-2mb or more of ram
-alott better sound quality and louder speaker
the s3 is awesome in sound (incall ,incall speaker)
-better screen resolution (more color)
other than that love my evo lte
I wish idiots would stop saying 1mb of ram
Just posting this as an example of HTC support.
For over a year now I have been communicating with support, first about the delayed update to HoneyComb then the broken GPS.
Here is my last reply to them
.
“Dear Travis,
First I want to thank you for your replies to my inquiries.
I purchased my 4 Flyers on HTC’s promise that it would be “upgraded to HoneyComb soon”.
That update took 9 months to receive.
A few days prior to receiving the update I purchased the offline maps from HTC so we could use our Flyers for travel. Of course the update broke the GPS so I wasted that money.
Now, here I am with four Flyers that do not function as intended.
Because HTC does not provide an official way to downgrade back to the original configuration I can’t even sell these devices.
All I ask is that HTC provide me with what I paid for.
I paid in excess of 2400 dollars for devices that functioned just fine until HTC decided to break them.
I may have lost my money this time but rest assured I will not lose any more to HTC.
Gary “
And here is their answer.
“Dear Gary Mattingly,
I am very sorry that you issues have not been resolved. I have a Flyer tablet myself and have the same GPS issue. Unfortunately we do not have a resolution for the GPS issue at this time. The issue will only be resolved with a software update which we are still working on. Unfortunately, we are also unable to revert your software or provide you with a refund. Again I apologize that I cannot resolve this issue for you.
If you have any other concerns, please let me know.
Let me know if I have successfully answered your question, please click here to complete this.
To send a reply to this message, please click here.
Sincerely,
Travis
HTC”
It seems as though HTC cannot even provide their employees with a working device.
It is my position … they broke my devices … they need to fix them.
I’ve been contacting them every 2 weeks for 4 months inquiring about the patch.
They are no longer responding to any of my inquires, sad to say this … maybe a company like this needs to go away.
Sealed phone body killed the EVO line for me. I went from EVO 4G, to EVO 3D, to Galaxy S3 due to a locked in battery and no expandable memory from HTC.
I will accept only one excuse for a non-replaceable battery: the device is waterproof.
Seeing how they’re treating Flyer users is pretty disheartening too…
I hope they get it together, even if I stick with Samsung going forward, having a good level of competition is good for all consumers.
Concentrate on getting updates out faster!!
I would love to see a second try at an EVO tablet or a One tablet that will not just compete with the competition but blow them away the way the original EVO did. I also think they should consolidate all their phones into the “HTC EVO-ONE” line and muscle them in to all the carriers. It will be that simple because a lot of the other things being asked about in this article won’t drive a majority of the consumers, only the one that read articles like this and spend time on sites like this. A majority of them don’t have a clue about what most of you mentioned except maybe the update to Jelly Bean. BTW, I’m thinking most of you are reading that “EVO-ONE” name I came up with and thinking, “That sounds cool as hell” – Think what a name like that could do in the market for HTC.