How do you sell more smart phones? Turn them into iPods

Smart phones are traditionally the preserve of the businessperson, teleworker or techie early adopter. The future may be very different, with teenagers using the devices to plug themselves into iTunes and the like, according to industry execs.

Speaking today at the Symbian Expo in London, Kevin Gillan, director of group business development for Carphone Warehouse, said smart phones that were geared up towards downloading and playing music would be a big hit with teenagers – the most prolific mobile phone buyers.

Gillan said mid-tier phones with multimedia and music functionality would have "greater appeal to youth market. There's a mass market opportunity out there around multimedia... and MP3," he added.

It seems the operators are equally excited about the possibility of less high-end handsets with a music focus.

Rene Schuster, global marketing director for business at Vodafone, said young people will drive smart phones to offer "music downloads and all sort of neat things".

The seeds of such a music-via-mobile revolution are already there – Apple recently inked a deal with Motorola to allow users to put iTunes tracks on their phones while rival song seller Loudeye is working with Nokia to produce a music platform.

Miles Flint, president of Sony Ericsson, said that he saw a move towards a greater portfolio of smart phones with individual focuses - "phone-oriented, camera-oriented, music-oriented". You can't sell "one phone ubiquitously to the whole market", he said.