With the acceleration of the offensive by Huawei, OPPO and vivo in India, the time and space left for Xiaomi may not be enough.
On October 16, Xiaomi officially announced that with the arrival of India’s Diwali, sales of Xiaomi’s Indian line increased by 30-40%. At the beginning of this month, Xiaomi announced that during the holiday season, the shipment of Xiaomi terminal has exceeded 5.3 million units, of which smart machines accounted for three-fifths, and the rest were IoT products.
Xia has been in India for 5 years and was initially sold online. In 2017, Xiaomi fired the first Xiaomi home in Bangalore and began to lay the line. At present, Xiaomi has opened more than 80 self-operated millet homes and more than 2,000 authorized stores in India.
The days of Xiaomi in China are not so good. According to canalys data, in the first two quarters of 2019, Xiaomi’s shipments plunged at a double-digit rate year-on-year. The expansion of Xiaomi’s home also shifted from 2018’s radical to 2019’s cautiousness. The data is still 586, far from the goal of Lei Jun three years and 1,000 homes.
Compared with the retreat in China, Xiaomi is in the limelight in India. According to IDC data, Xiaomi’s share in the Indian market in the second quarter of 2019 has reached 28.3%, with shipments of 36.9 million units, surpassing Samsung’s first. The recently released Redmi Note 8 series is also very lively.
In addition to mobile phones, Xiaomi has begun to sell TVs with higher unit prices in India, increasing the proportion of IoT devices. According to Raghu Reddy, head of Xiaomi India, sales of Xiaomi Smart TV in India this year have increased four-fold compared to 2018.
The Indian people’s enthusiasm for smart TV is high. Last year’s Diwali promotion season, Xiaomi LED TV sold 400,000 units in a month. In May of this year, Xiaomi announced that in the 14 months, Xiaomi sold 2 million TVs in India. After the mobile phone, Xiaomi won the first place in the field of smart TV, with a market share of 39%.
However, whether it is TV or mobile phone, Xiaomi is able to quickly occupy the market, relying on low prices. Helping Xiaomi to make a name in India is a 55-inch 4K TV – priced at 39,999 rupees (about 3,970 yuan), only half of the traditional veteran LG, Samsung, Sony.
In the short term, Xiaomi’s cost-effective strategy is indeed effective, but with the upgrade of the Indian market, Xiaomi will encounter the same problems as the Chinese market, that is, it is difficult to enter the high-end market. Xiaomi needs to take advantage of the Indian market and is not yet mature, and quickly increase the brand premium. However, with the acceleration of the offensive of Huawei, OPPO and vivo in India, the time and space left for Xiaomi may not be sufficient.