The three smartphone brands of Transsion Holdings; Tecno, iTel and Infinix are said to have accounted for over 10 million of all smartphones shipped in the first quarter of 2018, even as iTel, its last entrance entered the top 10 smartphone market for the first time.
This is the result of the latest research by Counterpoint’s Market Monitor service, which noted that despite weak demand from home country of China, Transsion Holdings have continued to enjoy patronage from countries and regions outside, where it has invested heavily. The key markets for Transsion Holdings are India, South East Asia, Europe, Middle East and Africa.
“The saturating China smartphone market is forcing the Chinese smartphone players to invest and expand beyond their home market. The efforts have been realized as the performance of Chinese brands in MEA, Europe and the rest of the Asian markets has been strong. The ideal smartphone market for Chinese brands are the emerging smartphone markets such as Bangladesh, Myanmar and Middle East & Africa where LTE is being launched for the first time,” said Research Analyst, Shobhit Srivastava, while commenting on the regional performance of Chinese brands during the quarter.
According to the latest research from Counterpoint’s Market Monitor service, the Top 10 players now capture 76 percent of the market, thereby leaving 600+ brands to compete for the remaining 24 per cent of the market, with global smartphone shipments declining 3 percent annually in Q1 2018.
The research disclosed that Nokia HMD, iTel, Xiaomi, Tecno, OnePlus and Huawei were the noted brands in the fastest growing category. OPPO, vivo, Samsung in the top 10 smartphone category reported declines in Q1 2018.
It also disclosed that Smartphone shipments declined 3 percent annually, reaching 360 million units in Q1 2018.
Commenting, Tarun Pathak, Associate Director at Counterpoint Research said, “The waning smartphone demand is due to a slow-down in developed markets where replacement cycles are lengthening with overall smartphone features and design reaching its peak. However, emerging markets still offer a sizeable opportunity for OEMs to expand and grow as smartphone penetration by users in still around 45 per cent. The average selling price of smartphones is increasing, too, in emerging markets with users upgrading from entry level to the mid smartphone segment. Hence, we expect OEMs to accelerate their go to market strategy and expansion in parts of Africa and the rest of the APAC region to capture the growing demand in CY 2018.”