Huawei plans to grab a portion of India’s smartphone market through retail partnerships
Chinese devicemaker Huawei is launching more affordable smartphones to capitalize on the emerging Indian telecom market.
The world’s No. 3 handsetmaker recently crossed the 50 million unit mark and is hoping to own 10% of the Indian market in the next year with its four new devices priced between 5,500 rupees ($86.52) and 9,500 rupees ($149.43).
“Currently, the affordable smartphone market in India has the largest market share, which is up to two-thirds, 66% approximately, of the total smartphone market share,” Huawei Telecommunications India director of sales P Sanjeev said.
Huawei plans to open 1,000 offline stores in India through September.
The company plans to reach out to Indian retailers to help them grow in the market. “For the brand-new G and Y series, we will be strengthening our presence with traditional multibrand retailers and by partnering with top modern trade players such as Croma, Reliance Digital, Sangeetha Retail and The Mobile Store in key cities like Delhi, Bangalore and Chennai amongst others,” Sanjeev said.
As part of a “make in India” initiative, the Indian government is even getting involved to accommodate Huawei’s entrance into the market, creating testing facilities in Chennai to screen equipment for embedded malware.
According to The Times of India, Huawei has submitted an FDI proposal for the Chennai facility to India’s foreign investment promotion board.
Korean device giant, Samsung currently leads the Indian smartphone market with a 22% share followed by Indian manufacturers Micromax (18%), Intex (8%) and Lava (7%). Another Chinese company, Xiaomi, currently makes up 4% of the market.
All four Huawei phones run on Android 4.4 Kit Kat under Huawei’s custom Android skin, called Emotion UI.
