Its 2018: Who is the biggest smartphone maker in India

The latest research by IDC indicates that smartphone shipments grew 20%to 33.5 million units in the June quarter 2018 compared to the year-ago period, boosted by the launch of online exclusive devices as well as strong shipments by offline retail-heavy players. 

Chinese major Xiaomi holds the top spot by shipping 10 million units whereas Samsung and Vivo have shipped 8 million and 4.2 million units respectively. Following are the market share of smartphone makers in India in 2018.

According to IDC, the rapid growth in the segment is the result of exclusive launches by e-comm. majors and strong shipment by offline heavy vendors on the back of high promotional activities and channel schemes. Further India will remain the fastest growing market and large smartphone market for next few years, making it must for any smartphone players to be here.

With increasing consolidation in the Indian market, it will be difficult for any new brand to enter into this space. The Indian market will continue to grow in low double-digit for the next couple of year. IDFC further states that Currently, 5 major vendors made up 79% of the smartphone market in the second quarter of 2018, marginalizing smaller brands.

It is expected that during the upcoming festive season in 2018, the market will grow further on the back of growing aggression by online majors, the sustained relevance of offline channels and several new launches planned by key vendors across all price segments.

The availability of financial schemes in the offline and online channels are driving affordability and thus pushing the overall average selling price to record high. This trend has further fuelled by declining internet data prices and due acceptance by mass. 

The premium end of the market (USD 500 and above) grew almost two times year-on-year mainly due to continued strong shipments of Samsung Galaxy S9 series and OnePlus 6.

As far as feature phone market is concerned, it remained resilient with the shipment of 44 million units during June 2018. Reliance Jio remains the main driver of the 4G feature phone segment with its JioPhone range of phones and claimed to be the top vendor in the overall feature phone market.

However, the 4G feature phone market saw a slight decline of 10% quarter on quarter with 19 million units. The 2G feature phone segment continues to decline further as local players struggle for survival in this segment and the segment is losing relevance due to an aggressive push in the 4G feature phone segment by Reliance Jio.