Top 5 reasons why xiaomi will Face hard time in india
By Vishal Pandey / july 22, 2014
Xiaomi the Chinese smartphone giant has entered the Indian market with a bang announcing their last year flagship MI3 boasting of Snapdragon 800 at jaw dropping price point of RS13999. Xiaomi has already created lot of buzz by their entry into the Indian market and pricing the MI3 at such a price has increased the excitement surrounding Xiaomi entry in the Indian market. So what does this means for Indian mobile industry and how will it change? Will Xiaomi be able to replicate its success back home in India? This are some of the question that will
be answered in coming days and will decide whether Xiaomi can take the no 1 position in this highly competitive market.
be answered in coming days and will decide whether Xiaomi can take the no 1 position in this highly competitive market.
There is no doubt that Xiaomi is gonna sell a lot of their phones in initial stage but will they be able to continue to do that in longer run is something that we would have to see. Today I will write about some of the challenges that I think Xiaomi will face in this highly lucrative Indian market.
1.) Shaking off the Chinese tag- Xiaomi phone’s and accessories are world class with top notch build quality which is way better than what the so called Indian brands offer. But despite this Xiaomi will still have problem due its Chinese tag. We all know what perception 80% of Indian mobile users have about Chinese company phones even if the phone is of Gionee, Oppo, and Xiaomi etc. No matter how much everyone explain them about the specs and features of mobile they will end up saying (hai to Chinese phone hi na) whatever it is Chinese. How Xiaomi will change it will be interesting to watch.
2.) Lack of marketing: - Now we all know that Xiaomi does not spend money on marketing. Now this is a double edged sword while it would help them reduce the cost of their phones it may also hurt them in longer run. Now we all know the importance of advertisement in India especially in the phone market. There are people who thinks that nexus line of devices are Chinese just because they never saw it’s add in TV or newspaper. The impact that advertisement can play on a phone sales is huge, For e.g.- Samsung Galaxy Grand which was not a great device from Samsung went on to become one of the best seller for Samsung. Even when the reviews of various tech website was negative the phone still managed to sell pretty decently. With Indian smartphone companies like MMX And Xolo spending big amount on marketing they have managed to make their presence felt to an average middle class buyers and even Chinese giants Gionee and Oppo realize this, Oppo while entering Indian market the first thing they did was two sign two big Bollywood stars as their brand ambassador. Now Xiaomi copes with this will be interesting. How do they plan to introduce their brand to an average buyer will be interesting to see. Because beyond your average tech junkies not everybody knows about Xiaomi, whether Xiaomi would be forced to spend on marketing or will they find some other way? What do you think let us know in the comments below
3.) No hands-on experience before buying - Xiaomi is currently launching its phone exclusively via flipkart. Motorola did this earlier and they were successful. But the fact remains that even now many Indians don’t trust online shopping. Especially in small cities and rural area. Plus there are many people who only buy phone after having a hand on experience with the phone at retail stores.
4.) Lack of source code- Xiaomi does not release the kernel source for its phone.(they released kernel source for mi2 after 1 year) while this may not matter for many people it’s a serious problem for some. No kernel source means no development. People who like to use different roms and kernel on their phone will be disappointed by it. Plus with no source code developers would probably not buy the phones and thus the chance that we might see roms in future also looks bleak. May be Xiaomi will release sources in India. Because in china not lots of people use roms so maybe Xiaomi never had to release it but here maybe they will be compelled to release it.
5.) Local Companies won’t go down without a fight- Xiaomi entry is likely to impact local companies like Xolo MMX etc. more than it would impact MNC like Samsung etc. But they wouldn’t stand quietly, in future we can see companies like Xolo bring a phone like mi3 probably a 1k or 2k cheaper. Wickedleaks has already started the price and specs war Xiaomi launching wammy youth an octa core phn a t8.5k which is cheaper than Xiaomi redmi note. Similarly we can expect Micromax to come up with something similar, and then you never know when the big boys may surprise us may be Samsung Sony etc. will bring a similar specs device at similar price points.
In all we can say that it is an interesting few months ahead of us. But one thing is for sure we the consumers will be the biggest gainers.
In all we can say that it is an interesting few months ahead of us. But one thing is for sure we the consumers will be the biggest gainers.
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