Mobile Sales in India – Indian Manufacturers Strikes it hot

Mobile Sales in India – Nokia Market Share Falls, Local Manufacturer Strikes it hot

IDC India has published a report on growth of mobile sales in India (for 2009) and here are some of the relevant data points to track:

• The growth has more or less flat [owing to low sales figure in Q1] – in total, 101.54 million units of sales were registered.
• Local manufacturers* have grabbed 17.5% market share [from 0.9%, a year back]
• Only 5 local manufacturers in 2008 and the number stands at 28 now!
• Nokia market share in India fell from 56.2% share in 2008 to 54.1% in 2009.
• Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd’s share rose marginally to 9.7% from 9.5%.
• LG’s share dropped from 7.2% to 6.4%,
• Of the local manufacturers, Micromax leads the race and holds a market share stands of 4.8%.

Like any market research, take this with a pinch of salt [for instance, Nokia has expressed reservations about the research, since IDC didn’t take into account its production facility in Chennai, which ships 50% of the manufactured mobile to India].

Nevertheless, this is an interesting result and rise of local companies shows that there is a value in local IP [eat this: Micromax Q5 phone is just like Blackberry/E71/72 with a far lesser price which Blackberrys of the world cannot even match].

What’s your take on the rise of Indian local mobile manufacturers?

*Top 5 Local manufacturers:

1. Micromax, 
2. Karbonn Mobiles, 
3. Spice Mobiles Ltd, 
4. Videocon Industries Ltd and 
5. Lava International Ltd.

Mobile Phone Market

Mobile Phone Market – Nokia Dominates GSM Market, LG Leads CDMA

However, Nokia is the dominant player on the GSM space, accounting for 63% of the installed base (phone’s currently in use) while LG rules CDMA with 48% of installed base market share. On looking at urban India GSM/CDMA combined installed base, Nokia is at the top with 54% of installed base market followed by LG (14%). LG is second most used handset manufacturer India primarily due to its dominant position in the CDMA.

Phone Manufacturer Usage:
April 2009 ending quarterly Average -  India Urban Mobile Phone Users (N=5,775)

Brands	Installed base*
	GSM	CDMA	Total (GSM + CDMA)
LG	4.4%	47.6%	14.4%
Motorola	7.8%	5.4%	7.2%
Nokia	62.6%	24.3%	53.7%
Samsung	9.0%	11.2%	9.5%
Sony-Ericsson	8.9%		6.8%

* – Users currently using the phone model