Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi has become the country’s first choice in handsets, clocking highest-ever shipments made by any brand in a year and with a growth of 9.2 per cent in 2019. While it has retained the number one smartphone vendor position for 10 consecutive quarters now, it has surpassed Samsung and Reliance Retail’s JioPhone in the feature phone segment for the first time in 2019, data from International Data Corporation shows.
Xiaomi has shipped 43.6 million units in 2019, while in the festive quarters of October-December 2019, it has topped the handset market with 16 per cent share. In the smartphone shipments alone, Xiaomi garnered 28.6 per cent share, followed by Samsung with 20.3 per cent. The rest of the market share was dominated by BBK Electronics-owned brands: Vivo 15.6 per cent, OPPO 10.7 per cent and Realme 10.6 per cent.
These three brands also grew much faster in the year, IDC noted. Vivo, in fact, has displaced Samsung as the second-largest smartphone vendor in India with a mammoth 96.5 per cent YoY growth in the fourth quarter, helped by its aggressive focus on offline market and price cuts on several models. Vivo shipped 6.9 million units, while Samsung’s shipments stood at 5.7 million units in Q4, falling from 6.8 million a year ago.
Notably, Samsung was the only brand among the top five, which continued to decline. For the full calendar year, the Korean giant may still hold the second spot but its shipment volumes fell by 2.8 per cent YoY.