After disrupting the Indian smartphone market with its budget offerings, Xiaomi is now looking forward to cement its position in the country by building a strong team. And what’s most important to a smartphone manufacturer, after research and development, of course!?
If you guessed sales, then you’ve hit the bulls eye. To strengthen its already ballistic online sales, the Chinese smartphone manufacturer has poached ex-Snapdeal senior director Raghu Reddy.
According to a tweet sent out by Xiaomi India head Manu Kumar Jain, Reddy came on board as the Head of Online Sales just last week. And the company’s aims to expedite his experience to attain the #1 spot in the country.
Welcome Raghu to @XiaomiIndia; our online sales lead. With his experience, I hope we can improve our #2 ranking ;)
— Manu Kumar Jain (@manukumarjain) July 14, 2016
Raghu Reddy has quit Snapdeal to join Xiaomi after a four year long stint, heading the mobile and electronics business at the e-commerce giant. So Reddy is probably the right man to head the sales of a smartphone company as he is aware of the thinking and mentality of the crowd buying goods online in India. He could easily provide his valuable input in deciding the right pricing and market strategy for the next release i.e of the Mi Note 2.
Before joining Snapdeal in 2012, Reddy has garnered immense market experience working as a Senior Consultant at the London HQ-ed consultancy firm Ernst & Young. He joined the firm right after completing his Masters in Business Administration from XLRI Jamshedpur in 2008. He majored in Business and Finance studies.
Xiaomi already has a strong online presence which account for over 90 per cent of the company’s sales in the country. But, the company is now also focusing its attention on tapping the offline market in India by partnering with two distributors — Just Buy Live and Innocomm.
Commenting on the decision to expand its offline presence, Jain adds that,
We are primarily an e-commerce company and we have brought our learning from the online model to our offline model. We have chosen Just Buy Live and Innocomm because of their unique models that distribute directly to retailers.
I believe that this strategic alliance will strengthen Mi India’s presence across India. As we expand to more than 5000 offline outlets, it allows more people to experience our products and purchase them easily.
