Half of India smartphone owners are familiar with 4G featurephones and 1 in 3 are considering them as either a replacement for their smartphone or as an additional device, according to a report from Strategy Analytics.
Strategy Analytics said 4G Featurephones will be a major factor in the replacement cycle in 2018 and 2019.
Reliance Industries supplies 4G Featurephones in India. Reliance Jio is the largest 4G mobile operator in the country. JioPhone has already become the largest selling featurephone player in India beating Samsung.
“The 4G featurephone phenomena reflects pent up demand for a more affordable smartphone like experience either as a replacement for existing devices or as an additional device for the huge portion of India buyers who use multiple SIMs,” David Kerr, VP at Strategy Analytics, said.
Rajeev Nair, senior analyst at Strategy Analytics, said the battle for replacement smartphone sales is intense with no local India vendor in the top six positions in Q1 2018. 4G Feature phones are set to grow by 4X in 2018 and could capture more than half of the overall feature phone market in India through 2020.
Strategy Analytics said the new Android GO based smartphones are expected to challenge this growth momentum from H2 2018 onwards.
