CMR: Xiaomi still dominates Indian smartphone market in January 2018

199IT original compilation

According to the latest data released by CMR, feature phone brands accounted for 72% of mobile phone shipments in India in January 2018, while smartphones accounted for only 28%. As a result, feature phones grew by 116%.

Reliance Retail's mobile phone brand LYF had a 27% market share, followed by Samsung (12%) and itel (8.2%).

Prabhu Ram, head of industry intelligence at CMR, said: "LYF has been growing continuously since the fourth quarter of 2017. This highlights the importance and dominance of the feature phone market in India. If LYF can maintain its strong growth, it is believed that it will become the champion of Indian mobile phone sales in the first quarter of 2018. This will threaten Samsung's dominance as the leader in the Indian mobile phone market."

Prabhu Ram added, "On the other hand, Samsung needs to increase its shipments by at least 25-30% in the rest of the first quarter of 2018 to maintain its leadership in the Indian mobile phone market. Going forward, Samsung should focus on increasing sales and the entry-level mobile phone market. Its strategic focus should be on launching 4G feature phones, joining Android Go, and phones bundled with telecom companies."

In the fourth quarter of 2017, India's smartphone market fell 19% month-on-month, while the feature phone market grew 36% month-on-month and 62% year-on-year.

In January 2018, Xiaomi continued to lead the Indian smartphone rankings (27%), with Samsung (25%) and Lava (8%) ranking second and third. The top three brands in the feature phone rankings were LYF (37.3%), itel (11%) and Samsung (7%).

Narinder Kumar, Industry Intelligence Analyst at CMR, said: “An interesting trend is the decline of Oppo. In January 2017, Oppo was one of the top four smartphone brands in India with a market share of 9%. In January this year, Oppo’s market share in India has dropped to 4% and it has not even made it into the rankings.”

199IT.com Originally compiled from: CMR. Please do not reprint without authorization