Samsung India is expecting to strengthen its presence in the smartphone market of the South Asian country, as recently revealed by Samsung Electronics SVP of Marketing Mohammad Asim Warsi. In an address to the media given earlier this week, the company’s senior executive said that the tech giant isn’t interested in resting on its laurels and will use the dominant position it earned to “further consolidate” its local market share. No specific details on the matter have been given by Mr. Warsi, with the marketing chief only revealing that Samsung will be seeking to deliver more innovative products and services in India moving forward.
Being the second largest smartphone market in the world, India is already an attractive proposition for most original equipment manufacturers, but especially so because it still isn’t exhibiting any serious signs of saturation, thus being a unique opportunity for handset makers. Samsung presently holds close to a quarter of the smartphone market in the country but has recently faced some aggressive competition from Xiaomi. While the Chinese tech giant is rapidly growing in India, it seemingly isn’t doing so at the expense of Samsung, albeit the Seoul-based company hasn’t been increasing its market share as swiftly as Xiaomi did in recent quarters. Samsung’s latest promotions on consumer electronics in India came in the form of a free Galaxy S8 Plus unit which is given to all buyers of its new QLED TVs, with the company also offering a $15 screen replacement to all of its smartphone users who buy a new device during this year’s Great Indian Festival sale.
Even though the South Korean conglomerate has largely established itself as the leading mobile brand in India thanks to its entry-level and mid-range offerings, it also isn’t neglecting the premium smartphone segment and is currently preparing for a local release of the Galaxy Note 8, its most powerful Android device to date which reportedly already started shipping to some Indian customers who pre-ordered it. While the firm has been doing extremely well in India, it also experienced an underwhelming performance in China in recent years, with Samsung China currently holding only around three percentage points of the largest phone market in the world due to numerous reasons, according to several industry trackers.