As shown before, mobile phones are no longer only communication devices. The new high-priced mobile phones have achieved the status of art objects.

“We assemble our phones by hand to take them to the level of Fabergé eggs,” said Chris Harris, the global marketing director for Vertu, the Nokia subsidiary that sells phones at prices ranging from €4,000 up to €80,000, or $5,100 to $102,000. “Our customers purchase phones because people will notice them.”

Niche phone markets account for less than 0.5 percent of the total mobile phone market, but Lewis said he expected that figure to grow to 19 percent within five years. “Design, look and feel will become more important in the market,” Lewis said.

“These phones offer all the technical things that people really use, not the latest mobile phone functions,” Olivier said. “The most important function for many users might be a hot line we will put in to get you a concierge service.”

“Buyers of our phones realize how much impressions matter,” said Jill Blumenfeld, retail manager at the Vertu shop in Paris. “Ask yourself how bad it looks at a meeting when you wear a Patek Philippe watch, carry an Hermès briefcase, use a Montblanc pen and then answer a plastic phone?”