India’s handset market slumps 25% in Q1

India’s mobile device market slumped 25% year-on-year during the first quarter of 2019 due to a collapse in the feature phone segment, according to CyberMedia Research (CMR).

The research firm estimates that feature phone shipments shrank by around 49% during the quarter, while smartphone shipments grew by 10%.

4G-enabled handsets represented 66% of total devices shipped during the quarter, with 2G-only devices accounting for the remainder.

“The overall market decline was on expected lines for Q1 2019. The above industry average stock build-up at the end of the previous quarter resulted in lower shipments. Also, the recent change in eCommerce rules in India impacted the online dependent players,” CMR Industry Intelligence Group lead analyst Narinder Kumar said.

Samsung led the overall mobile market during the quarter with a 22% market share, but China’s Xiaomi led the smartphone market with a 30% share to Samsung’s 27%. Xiaomi also continued to rule the low-cost segment for devices below 7,000 rupees with a 41% market share, while Samsung topped the mid-range 7,000 rupees to 25,000 rupee segment.

The top five leaderboards was rounded out by LYF (13% market share), Vivo (6%) and Lava (6%).