Micromax eyes No 2 slot in India smartphone market

NEW DELHI: Aiming to become the second largest smartphone seller in India, homegrown mobile handset firm Micromax will expand its portfolio with eight new devices across various price points to attract consumers.

The company also aims to double monthly sales to 1.5 lakh units by the end of 2012.

"Data shows that we are already ahead of most of our competitors in the smartphone space and we are confident of reaching the number two position by the end of 2012 ... We currently have a dozen smartphones and four new ones will be launched in the next few weeks," Micromax CEO Deepak Mehrotra told PTI.

He added that four more smartphones will be added in the coming months.

According to third party data quoted by the company, Micromax sold over 67,000 smartphones in July this year, much higher than its competitors like HTC and Karbonn.

Smartphones, globally and in India, are gaining popularity and there has been a significant surge in sales volumes over the past few quarters.

According to a CyberMedia study, smartphone sales in the country increased by 87 per cent to 11.2 million units in 2011 from 6 million units in 2010 compared to seven per cent year-on-year growth in the feature phones category.

Over 150 smartphone models by more than 30 vendors were launched during 2011.

While Nokia emerged as the leader in the smartphones segment with a 38 per cent share, Samsung (28 per cent) and Research in Motion (15 per cent) share followed in the list.

"Consumers are looking for a value product. Price is an important factor in decision making and our endeavour is to provide quality product at the right price. As a strategy, we want to play across price points," Mehrotra said.

The company will launch its Superfone Pixel A90, a dual SIM phone with 4.3-inch super-AMOLED touchscreen and equipped with 8MP camera, 1GHz processor and is priced at Rs 12,999. The other launches include Superfone Canvas A100, Ninja 3.5 and Ninja 4.

Micromax is also betting big on its tablet PC range. It had launched its FunBook device in April and is expanding the range as well.

It has launched the 10.1-inch version of the tablet PC and will add two devices -- FunBook Alpha and FunBook Infinity -- in the range soon.

"We launched our 7-inch device in April and sold 1.4 lakh devices in just 100 days. We are confident that the new 10.1-inch tab will also do well," Mehrotra said.

Smartphones and tablet PCs (combined) currently account for about 30 per cent of the company's revenues.

"By the end of the fiscal (March 2013), the contribution should increase to 40 per cent," he said.