In our today’s update on the battle for brands segment, our friends at Data Fintech have shared some insights on the performance of two smartphone brands, Oppo and Xiaomi. The data shows that Oppo was the most popular brand in the entire Q1-2017.
Well, first let’s talk about this two brands. Both of them are new entrants in the local market although they command a pretty good market in Asia.
Oppo entered the competitive Kenyan market last year and has been making inroads, riding on its highly developed camera technology. The brand had a strong finish in 2016, growing 133 percent in the global smartphone market, according to the latest data from research firm IDC. In 2016, the smartphone accounted for 6.8 percent of the global smartphone market and had four straight quarters of more than 100 percent year-on-year growth.
The company was founded in 2004, the company initially manufactured consumer video and audio equipment, including high-end Blu-ray players before officially entering the mobile phone market in 2008. The Oppo brand first launched internationally in 2010 when it expanded into Thailand. It has continued to expand throughout South East Asia, the Americas, the Middle East, and Africa and is now available 20 markets, with the brand already registered in 116 countries as at April 2015.
Xiaomi, on the other hand, entered the Kenyan market in the same year by launching the Xiaomi Redmi Note 2. Kenya was the third country Xiaomi was tapping into after Nigeria and South Africa. The company said it has keenly been following the Kenyan market and had identified it as key to bring in their budget friendly devices.
Read>>Xiaomi enters the Kenyan Market, introduces the Xiaomi Redmi Note 2
Xiaomi has been in the market for 7 years now and the Chinese smartphone manufacturer has been poised to make it big. Headquartered in China in Beijing, Xiaomi has established itself as one of the world’s leading mobile phone manufacturers, claiming to have shipped over 65 million handsets in a single year. Any Kenyan tech blogger like my friends at Android Kenya, TechArena, MobiTrends or Dickson at Tech-ish.com will agree with me that the company has a unique business model where it focuses on giving high-quality offerings to its customers at reduced prices. Unfortunately, we have not seen so much of Xiaomi locally. This is probably something we should try looking into.
Back to data from Data Fintech, the mobile phone dealers listing both brands on the marketplace is starting to take shape with Oppo leading with 8 dealers compared Xiaomi at 6 dealers. In stock value, both brands are minor players in the local market accounting for a total of 0.36 percent of the mobile phone stock value in the Ksh. 10,000 to-20,000 price segment.
The market insights are based on data collected from the online marketplace pigiame.co.ke, over a period of 16 months (January 2016 to April 2017.) This content is a snapshot extracted from the Kenya Electronic Market Report, provided by Data Fintech.
Well, which of the two brands would you buy and why? if you are using any of them currently, what is your experience like? Drop us a comment in the comments section below.
Read>>XIAOMI Redmi NOTE 2 REVIEW, Another Brand to watch out for in Kenya
