Indian mobile handsets market grows 10 percent in 2011

The Indian mobile handsets market grew 10 percent in 2011 with the sale of 183 million devices, including 18 million 3G mobile phones and around 97 million multi-SIM handsets, said a study Thursday.

Nokia remained the overall market leader in each segment, said IT research firm CyberMedia in its mobile handsets market review for 2011.

Nokia gained 31 percent share followed by Samsung with 15 percent and Micromax at five percent in the overall market.

In the smartphone category, the Indian market saw as many 150 new models being launched by over 30 vendors. Its shipments touched 11.2 million units in 2011, recording 87 percent growth year-on-year.

Nokia, Samsung and Blackberry-maker Research in Motion were the top players in the segment, respectively with 38, 28 and 15 percent market share.

The study also said the share of android operating system in the smartphone category saw tremendous growth of over 600 percent during the year.

“This growth was mainly on account of an increasing number of handset vendors adopting android as preferred operating system for their smartphones.”

“In 2012, the proportion of smartphones with extended features like NFC (near-field communications) and 3D gaming are likely to increase,” said Naveen Mishra, lead telecom analyst, CyberMedia Research.

“It will be interesting to see how Microsoft and Nokia take their partnership to the next level with a new range of smart devices based on the Windows 7.5 Mango OS platform,” he added.

Multi-SIM handset shipments accounted for 57 percent of the total India mobile handsets market during the year representing an year-on-year increase of 61 percent.

In 2011, almost 250 unique 3G handset models were shipped from approximately 30 different vendors. The total shipments of 3G phones in the country touched nearly 18 million units, a year-on-year growth of 153 percent.

“3G is a relatively new phenomenon in India with active subscribers estimated at only 15 million as of Dec 2011. This may be directly attributed to the lack of 3G network availability in many locations and the poor quality of service experienced by existing subscribers,” Mishra said.

“Therefore, in many respects 2012 will be a ‘test year’ for the growth and adoption of 3G handsets and data services in the country,” he added.