Driven by a narrowing price gap, Smartphones begin to penetrate deep into Indian markets

India: Smartphone contribution to Mobile phones sales and %age

1. Smartphone shipments to India exceeded 10 million units mark for the first time in Q3, 2013. For Q3, 2013, the numbers stood at 11.10mln mark.
2. The import numbers of smartphones to India have increased by 192% (Q3 2013 versus Q3 2012)
3. Coupled with the fall of volumes in featurephone shipments by a factor 25.5% (QoQ 2013 versus 2012), Smartphones now contribute 21% of the total mobile shipments in the country
4. Mobile phone markets in India have moved past the historic highs of 58-59 mln units/quater(Q3/Q4 2012).

Smartphones have now acquired the critical mass and threshold pricing (~Rs.3500-5000) to capture mass markets in India substituting the feature phone. The change agents for this rapid shift of consumer preference towards Smartphones have been the narrowing price gap between feature phones and smartphones.

Correspondingly, the number of internet users on handhelds (Smartphones) is expected to grow exponentially as per a recent IAMAI report which pegs a 20-30 million increase in internet mobile user base every quarter.