Smartphones driving mobile phone sales in India: report

Tthe Indian mobile phones market is being increasingly driven by significant growth in smartphone sales, which is driving overall mobile phone sales across the country, says a new study.

According to the study by  CyberMedia Research, mobile handset sales in India increased 20.8 per cent to 221.6 million units in 2012 while smart phones sales registered a 35.7 per cent year-on-year growth.

The study reveals smartphone sales rose 75.2 per cent half year-on-half year growth in 2012. it said while Nokia is the largest-seeling brand the Indian mobile phone market, Samsung rules the smartphones segment.

Feature phones too clocked impressive growth with sales rising 19.9 per cent to 206.4 million in 2012 from 172.2 million in the previous year.

The study said Nokia was the largest player in the Indian mobile phone market with a 21.8 per cent share in terms of unit shipments, while Samsung came in second with a 13.7 per cent share while Micromax took the third spot with 6.6 per cent share.

In the smartphones segment, Samsung led with a 43.1 per cent share while Nokia ranked second with a share of 13.3 per cent and Sony Mobiles brought up the third spot with 8.2 per cent in terms of unit shipments.

Meanwhile, an online survey conducted recently by mobile marketing firm Upstream revealed that in developing markets such as Saudi Arabia, India, Nigeria and Brazil, 32 per cent customers would prefer Samsung over Nokia (22 per cent), Apple (21 per cent) and Blackberry (10 per cent).

The survey polled over 1,000 adults in four countries to find out that Samsung was a leading brand in comparison with Nokia, Apple and Blackberry.

However, Nokia was the most popular brand only in Nigeria, with 37 per cent preference.

While in the US, Apple continued to be a popular smartphone, in developing countries Samsung was the preferred choice. In fact, in most developed countries such as US and UK, 32 per cent of prospective buyers opted for the iPhone as against 22 per cent for Samsung.

In Nigeria, two-third of the surveyed people relied on phones. In India, one-third people preferred laptops over other gadgets.

Nokia and Blackberry achieved preference more in the African nations. It is however, worth nothing that Samsung had an increased demand across the world because of the rising popularity of Galaxy S III