Jio dominates feature phone market with 4G phones

Reliance Jio has captured almost half of the total feature phone market in India driven by the success of its JioPhone, Counterpoint Research said.
Jio India featurephone market Q2 2018Samsung has lost significant feature phone market share in India. The development indicates that there is strong demand for 4G feature phones from Reliance despite perceptions about the poor quality of phones.

Reliance Jio has 47 percent share in the feature phone market as compared with 9 percent for Samsung. Nokia has captured 8 percent share in the Indian feature phone market, said the report.

The significant share of Reliance Jio in the feature phone market will be a bad news for rivals such as Airtel and Vodafone Idea.

Reliance Jio is likely to maintain the growth momentum as it refreshed its Jiophone, coupled with an aggressive upgrade offer of INR 501 (<US$10) and bringing popular apps including WhatsApp to Jiophone 2.

Samsung has beaten Xiaomi in the Indian smartphone market with an improved performance in the second quarter.

Samsung has regained its lead in Q2 2018 with 29 percent share in the smartphone segment thanks to strong performance of models such as Galaxy J6, Galaxy J2 2018 and Galaxy J4 focusing on the budget segment.