Xiaomi Growth Flat in Indian Smartphone Market, Realme Shipments Spiked in 2019: IDC

The three smartphone brands from the China-based BBK Group -- led by Realme -- were the fastest growing brands in the Indian smartphone market in calendar year 2019, while Xiaomi remained flat and Samsung went into negative growth (year-over-year), the International Data Corporation (IDC) said on Friday.

Xiaomi led the market with 28.6 percent share and registered annual shipments of 43.6 million units in 2019 -- the highest ever smartphone shipments made by any brand in a year -- but the growth slumped to 9.2 percent (YoY) in 2019 from 2018, IDC reported.

Realme at fifth position with 10.6 percent market share saw a massive 263.5 percent growth, Vivo with 15.6 percent market share registered 67 percent growth and Oppo with 10.7 percent market share logged 60.5 percent growth in the calendar year 2019.

Samsung with 20.6 percent market share saw - 2.8 percent growth in 2019. Its Galaxy M series, particularly Galaxy M30s, performed well in the online segment, according to the IDC 'Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.'

Overall, the BBK Group -- sans its OnePlus brand -- registered 36.9 percent market share.

"Vivo became the leader in the offline channel. The continued focus on its offline channel, despite the exclusive lineup in online channel and presence across price segments, led to this phenomenal rise in 2019," said the IDC report.

Oppo climbed to the fourth position in the fourth quarter in 2019, with a huge YoY growth of 88.4 percent on the back of its affordable A series and successful Reno 2 series.

Ironically, other smartphone brands like Nokia, LG, Sony, Blackberry declined by whopping 46 percent in terms of market share.

In the mid-premium ($300-500) segment, Vivo continued to lead the market with 28 percent share in 2019, on the back of the high-selling Vivo V15 Pro, followed by OnePlus at 20.2 percent share owing to the OnePlus 7 model.

Is Realme C3 price likely to usher in a budget smartphone revolution? We discussed this on Orbital, our weekly technology podcast, which you can subscribe to via Apple Podcasts or RSS, download the episode, or just hit the play button below.