Honor will increase its offline presence and reduce the prices of its products in an effort to gain market share in the lucrative Indian smartphone market. George Zhao, the global president of the smartphone brand, mentioned during an interview with The India Times that it will be opening exclusive demo shops within India soon, although the executive did not provide a concrete time frame for the opening of the shops. Aside from Honor, a number of device makers have already recognized the need to improve its offline presence, with Motorola already opening a number of pop-up Moto Hub Stores to complement its online presence. Increasing the market share in India will likely help in boosting both the financial standing and viability of a smartphone manufacturer within the next few years since only 25 percent of the country’s population is using smartphones.
Another strategy for the smartphone brand plans to implement in India is to lower the price of its offerings. In fact, Zhao mentioned in the interview that they will offer its latest handset, the Honor 7X, at a very competitive price. The Honor 7X is currently on sale in China with the base model priced at 1,299 Yuan, which translates to $196 at the current exchange rate. Meanwhile, the higher-end variants with 64GB and 128GB of internal flash storage are available for $258 and $304 respectively. Given the executive’s statements, it is possible that Honor will sell the handset in India at an even lower price.
The Honor 7X is powered by the Kirin 659 chipset, which is comprised of an octa-core 64-bit CPU with a maximum frequency of 2.36GHz and the Mali-T830 MP2 GPU. The device sports a 5.93-inch display with a resolution of 2160 by 1080 and an aspect ratio of 18:9. Contained within the handset are 3GB of RAM and a 3,340mAh non-removable battery, while the internal flash storage can be expanded using a microSD card. The device ships with Android 7.1 Nougat pre-installed with Huawei’s proprietary skin, EMUI, running on top of Google’s operating system. Incorporated into the skin are artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities that the smartphone manufacturer first shipped with the Honor Magic. An SOS feature is also included with the handset as a response to the request of the Indian government, and Honor takes pride that it is the first company to comply with the state’s request. More information about the availability and pricing of the device in India will likely be available soon.