India might have emerged as the one of the fastest growing smartphone markets in the world, but Samsung now believes that the country has reached its saturation level. The Korean giant expects India’s smartphone market to consolidate. The growth is expected to slump down to 23-24 per cent by volume this year, as compared to 30% in the previous one.
Market growth rate is bound to go down, due to the base effect,
says Manu Sharma, head of Samsung’s mobile phone business(via ET).
This statement underlines the current trend where consumers are opting for an affordable option manufactured locally as they are often able to provide them with better value for their money. Consumers are not of the ideology of replacing their smartphones just because of one new feature addition. Thus, there are very few smartphone replacements each year in our country.
Amid the consolidating scenario, Samsung still believes that its smartphones sales will fare well on the back of the wide range of phone models available across all price segments. Samsung has recently also introduced two new smartphones for the Indian masses– Galaxy J2 2016 with smart-glow LED notification in the budget segment and Note 7 in the premium one.
Commenting on the launch of Note 7 in India, Sharma adds,
We believe Note series will help us consolidate our share in the premium segment (Rs 30,000 upwards).
And according to a report released by Korean shipment tracker Counterpoint Technology, Samsung outruns Apple in India’s premium smartphone market in 2015-16. Samsung’s share in the premium smartphone market rocketed to 47 percent in 2015-16 as compared to the 35 percent share in 2014-15, while Apple finished the year at 45 percent in comparison to 43 percent.
According to an analysis by IDC, smartphone sales this quarter have risen by just 0.2 percent from the 334.3 million units in Q1 2015. This marks the smallest year-over-year growth rate and the first time in history that smartphone sales have flat-lined.
The IDC says that the minimal growth this quarter is primarily attributed to strong smartphone saturation in developed markets, but India was the only lone bright spot. In 2015, India smartphone shipments grew 28.8% to 103.6 million, positioning it as one of the fastest-growing smartphone markets in Asia-Pacific.
