Smartphone sales may be declining around the world, but it is boom period in India. And it is not even festival season.
The sale of mobiles in the April to June period, Quarter 2, went up to 3.8 crore smartphones across India, according to figures released by global consultancy firm Counterpoint Research. This is an increase over the same quarter the previous year, and seems to have been fuelled by new launches, online offers and some premium brands going in for major price cuts.
Counterpoint associate director Tarun Pathak points out that, “Brands which focused on offline channels expanded to online channels with online-exclusive series. Similarly, brands which entered the market with online-exclusive series are now expanding their reach towards offline channel by forming partnerships with key offline retailers.” All this even as mobile sales continued their decline worldwide for the seventh straight quarter.
It is obviously a different story here in India. “In India, the pricing sweet-spot for consumers has moved to the Rs 10,000-20,000 price band and it will remain the biggest contributor in the India smartphone segment this year. Brands are focusing on bringing the latest premium level specifications such as notch display, full-screen view, multiple rear cameras, pop up selfie feature and in-display sensor technology in this segment to stimulate consumer demand”, Pathak added.
Chinese brands now have almost absolute dominance in the Indian smartphone market. In fact, out of the top five smartphone brands in India, excluding South Korea's Samsung which comes in at No.2, all other brands are Chinese. While Xiaomi continues to be the market leader in India with a 28 per cent market share, Realme is the biggest gainer in the past three months. It grew from holding just one per cent of the market in the corresponding period last year to garnering 9 per cent now. Realme, which scored this on the back of some strong online discount offers, is the fastest growing brand in India, the only brand to hit 80 lakh units of sale within an year of debut in the country.
OnePlus surpassed Samsung and Apple (whose iPhone saw an upsurge after massive price cuts) to become the top selling premium smartphone, on the back of the strong sales of its latest flagship, the OnePlus 7.