The year Chinese smartphone players dominated Indian market

There are nearly 650 million mobile phone users in India -- and over 300 million of them have a smartphone. For these users, Chinese players became the first choice this year as they launched devices with compelling features, thus dominating the budget and mid-range price segment in the country.

Chinese vendors captured 49 percent of the Indian mobile phone handset market in the first quarter of 2017 -- with a 180 percent (year-on-year) revenue growth -- threatening to wipe out domestic players from the overall handset segment.

Among the top Chinese brands, Xiaomi witnessed the biggest growth this year.

With a market share of 23.5 per cent and having shipped 9.2 million smartphones in the third quarter this year, Xiaomi became the fastest-growing smartphone brand with a growth rate of nearly 300 per cent (year-on-year) in the third quarter this year.

According to IDC, Samsung had 23.5 per cent market share in India, similar to Xiaomi, the Lenovo-Motorola combine was at 9 per cent, Vivo at 8.5 per cent and OPPO at 7.9 per cent.

For Xiaomi, its Redmi Note 4 device that was launched in January at Rs 9,999 for the base model (2GB RAM and 32GB onboard storage) proved to be a game-changer and its best-selling smartphone too. The company shipped approximately four million units of the device in this quarter, said IDC.

Chinese brands like Huawei (which sells its youth-centric sub-brand Honor in India), Vivo, Motorola (a Lenovo brand) and OPPO's performance remained strong and contributed to more than half of the total smartphone shipments in the country.

Aiming to push its position up in the highly competitive Indian market, Honor launched flagship products at "unbeatable prices", like the highly-successful Honor 8 Pro (Rs 29,999) and Honor 7X (starting at Rs 12,999).

Vivo and OPPO's aggressive marketing spends also paid them hefty dividends. With smartphone growth nearing saturation in metros, Chinese players were also busy building their base in the tier II and III cities.

When it comes to manufacturing in India, Xiaomi announced its third plant in the country based out of Noida and the first facility for power banks in partnership with Hipad Technology.

Spread across 230,000 square feet, the Noida unit is a dedicated facility for Xiaomi power banks where the Mi Power Bank 2i will be assembled. The company already has two smartphone manufacturing plants in Sri City, Andhra Pradesh, where more than 95 per cent of its smartphones sold in India are assembled locally.

Meanwhile, South Korean giant Samsung also announced that it would invest Rs 4,915 crore in expanding its Noida manufacturing plant to double the production capacity of both mobile phones and consumer electronics.

The Foreign Investment Promotion Board approved OPPO's request to open single-brand retail stores in the country. With this decision, OPPO became the first smartphone company to get this opportunity in India.

The Chinese players also handled the post-demonetisation ripples well with high decibel marketing, increased credit line to distributors and efficient channel management.

Global vendors, led by Samsung, were able to withstand the aggressive Chinese players post-demonetisation owing to their good distributor coverage and penetration in the Indian market.

Aiming to gain a further foothold in the offline smartphone market, Xiaomi opened its first "Mi Home" store in Bengaluru in May and plans to add 100 such stores in the next two years.

Similarly, Lenovo-owned Motorola opened six "Moto Hubs" in Delhi-NCR and Mumbai and plans to open 50 more by the end of this year.

Huawei's sub-brand Honor announced opening four more exclusive service centres in Kolkata, Hyderabad, Lucknow and Guwahati. Its service centres are already operating in 17 cities.

India this year surpassed the US to become the second-largest smartphone market in the world after China. Yet, according to Counterpoint Research, only one fourth of India's population uses smartphones, thus making the country an attractive destination for Chinese players in the mobile ecosystem.

Source: The year Chinese smartphone players dominated Indian market

Xiaomi launches smartphone for entry-level market

Chinese smartphone manufacturer Xiaomi officially launched on Wednesday its latest smartphone, the Redmi 5A, a product that targets the entry-level market in Indonesia.

"I believe the launch of the Redmi 5A will change the smartphone industry in Indonesia and encourage phone users to shift to smartphones," Xiaomi South Pacific Region head and Xiaomi Indonesia country manager Steven Shi said in his speech during the launching ceremony.

The five-inch device has various high-quality features such as a larger storage capacity, a 13-megapixel PDAF main camera, a 5-megapixel front camera and long-lasting battery with a capacity of 3000 mAh.

"This smartphone is the best smartphone in its class. Why? Because it's excellent in all aspects -- its technology, design and, of course, the price," said Xiaomi global director of product management and marketing Donovan Sung.

The Redmi 5A will have a selling price of Rp 999,000 (US$69.93), lower than the price in China, which is Rp 1.3 million.

"Our smartphone price in China is normally the cheapest due to marketing costs required in other countries. However, we proudly announce that the Redmi 5A price in Indonesia is the cheapest," said Sung.

The Redmi 5A will be available for purchase on Dec. 27 from e-commerce platform Lazada.co.id. Moreover, the company is also cooperating with Indosat Ooredoo to offer both prepaid and postpaid package bundling. According to the International Data Corporation (IDC), Xiaomi holds 6.2 percent of the smartphone market in Indonesia. (fny/bbn)

Source: Xiaomi launches smartphone for entry-level market

China's innovation, not investments, should worry Europe

For several years now China has been increasingly investing in Europe.

In 2016 Chinese companies invested €35 billion in the EU.

Often these investments are in advanced manufacturing sectors or meant to buy certain technologies. Afraid of losing some crown jewels of the European economy, the EU is preparing measures to halt this trend.

But perhaps Europe shouldn´t worry too much about this. After all, the next wave is already coming: Chinese innovation and technology which will conquer the world.

And the first signs are visible. A few week ago, Europe launched two initiatives which are symptomatic and a reaction to the Chinese threat. Europe decided to form an alliance among some top European companies in order to regain lost ground on Chinese electric car battery manufacturers.

And because Chinese high-speed trains and their technology are being sold worldwide, French Alstom and German Siemens have formed a coalition against the Chinese train manufacturing company CRRC, which has recently won several projects in Europe.

Over the past few years China has implemented a policy which focuses on mass entrepreneurship, technology and innovation.

Pivot to private sector

Now the traditional sectors which spurred its economic growth have become weaker - a trend reinforced by increasingly more expensive Chinese labour - the Chinese government hopes that the private sector and innovation will become the new drivers of the economy.

As so many trends in China, big government is the driving force behind this. And that might just work. China has a labour force of 800 million, among whom 170 million have received higher education or possess high professional skills.

Add in the massive number of Chinese students who studied abroad, and return now in increasingly bigger proportion back home, and one can understand that China possesses a critical mass of innovation and entrepreneurial spirit.

The effects of this policy are becoming increasingly clear.

In 2016 China's ZTE Corporation overtook its crosstown rival Huawei Technologies as the biggest filer of international patent applications.

Last year Chinese companies spent 14 times more money on R&D than in the year 2000.

Only US companies spend more on R&D. Additionally China is home of a thriving startup scene which plenty of venture capital and hot money pouring in. In 2016 Chinese venture capital funds tripled their budgets to €320bn. They are responsible for 25 percent of the global venture capital investments.

From 'Made in China' to 'Invented in China'?

Especially in the internet sector Chinese innovation is leaving its global mark. Chinese society is already much more digitalised than western counterparts, but nowadays it's simply impossible to live without a smartphone in China.

Last year alone, 467 million smartphones were sold in China, and there are more than 730 million active internet users. The Chinese e-commerce market is simply gigantic and is predicted in 2020 to be bigger than the Unites States, Great Britain, Japan, France and Germany combined.

WeChat, with its 900 million users, is an absolute marvel of Chinese technology.

It is one platform for communication, marketing, payments and e-commerce. All-in-one and made in China.

Chinese tech companies are also conquering the world with new products and services of superior quality. Baidu, Alibaba, Tencent and Xiaomi belong to the top ten of the biggest internet and technology companies worldwide.

But three of them only entered the rankings since 2013.

In 2014 Xiaomi was the world's most valuable tech startup. Silicon Valley is looking now more and more to China where innovation and entrepreneurship go hand-in-hand.

The focus is especially on Shenzhen with its 30,000 technology companies - and a combined value of more than €200bn.

That evolution is also starting to leave its mark internationally. In the past only big (ie state-owned companies) were expanding globally, but now the second wave of internationalisation is taking shape. Buses from BYD, the global leader in electrical cars, are already driving around in the London city centre.

One third of all 'unicorns' are now coming from China.

Ambitious Chinese startups expand internationally from the very beginning, with increasing success.

Besides famous names like Xiaomi, Mobike or DJI, is Musical.ly - with its 100 million users worldwide - one of those startups which go global form the very start, which is way they are being called micro-multinationals.

It's obvious that China is transforming itself again, and that the next wave of innovation and private entrepreneurship will be the wave of the future, with huge global consequences.

Sven Agten is an author on China, and Asia-Pacific president for a German multinational

Source: China's innovation, not investments, should worry Europe

China's Huawei to expand in US smartphone market next year

Chinese smartphone brand Huawei will start sales through U.S. carriers next year, a Huawei executive said Monday, stepping up the No. 3 global handset seller's presence in the home market of rival Apple Inc.

The president of Huawei Technologies Ltd.'s consumer business, Richard Yu, said he would announce details at next month's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. He said sales would start with the flagship Mate 10 but declined to give a price or say through which carrier or carriers they would be sold.

Huawei sells some models in U.S. electronics stores and online but has a minimal share of an American market in which most sales are through carriers. Globally, the company trails Samsung and Apple by handset shipments but leads in China, the biggest market, and says it expects to ship a total of 150 million units this year.

"We will sell our flagship phone, our product, in the U.S. market through carriers next year," said Yu in an interview. "I think that we can bring value to the carriers and to consumers. Better product, better innovation, better user experience."

Yu expressed confidence the smartphone business wouldn't be affected by American government concerns Huawei might be a security threat, which derailed U.S. demand for its network gear.

"In consumer sales, when people really start using Huawei products, they will change their minds," said Yu.

Huawei, founded in 1987 by a former military engineer, is the first Chinese brand to break into the top ranks of global technology suppliers.

The company, headquartered in Shenzhen, near Hong Kong, is the world's biggest supplier of switching equipment used by telephone and internet companies. It has manufactured mobile phones since the 1990s and launched its own smartphone brand in 2010.

Huawei reported 2016 profit of 37 billion yuan ($5.4 billion) on revenue of 521.6 billion yuan ($75.6 billion). The company is owned by its employees, with no publicly traded shares, but reports financial results in an effort to allay security concerns in the United States and Europe.

Helped by a strong position in China, India and other developing markets, sales by its premium-priced Huawei and mid-market Honor smartphone brands have grown faster than those of Samsung or Apple. That prompted suggestions Huawei might pass its American rival.

In the latest quarter, Huawei's handset shipments rose 16.1 percent over a year earlier to 39.1 million, well ahead of Apple's 2.6 percent growth to sales of 46.7 million, according to IDC. Samsung sales expanded 9.5 percent to 83.3 million units.

"We are a Top 3 smartphone supplier but we are very close to the Top 2. So maybe quickly we can be Top 2," said Yu.

The Mate 10, unveiled in October, offers an extra-wide display, high-end cameras and other advanced features at prices 15 to 30 percent below those of Samsung and Apple.

Yu said the Mate 10 will be "competitively priced" in the United States but Huawei expects to compete on performance instead of cost.

"Our strength is in developed markets," where consumers will pay for performance, said Yu. "We are not a cheap, low-cost company."

Also next year, Huawei plans to start selling through carriers in Japan, where its phones already are sold in stores, Yu said.

"I think next year is a very important year for Huawei," he said.

Huawei's U.S. business suffered a setback when a congressional panel recommended in October 2013 that phone carriers avoid doing business with it or a smaller Chinese rival, ZTE Corp. Beijing rejected the report as false and an effort to block Chinese companies from the U.S. market.

Huawei denied being a security threat and rejected the U.S. complaints as politically motivated or possibly an attempt by competitors to keep it out of the market.

"They are lying," said Yu. "We are a company that really cares about cybersecurity and privacy protection. We do a lot better than the other vendors."

———

Huawei Technologies Ltd.: www.huawei.com

Source: China's Huawei to expand in US smartphone market next year

Samsung, LG Pegged to Unveil New Mid-Range Phones at CES 2018

According to a South Korean publication, Samsung and LG will be announcing new smartphones at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show (2018) that is scheduled to take place at Las Vegas in early January. Both the companies are rumored to debut new midrange phones at the upcoming CES 2018 event.

Samsung will be reportedly announcing the Galaxy A8 and Galaxy A8+ smartphones at CES 2018 whereas the LG may debut LG K10 smartphone. As of this writing, there is no official confirmation from Samsung and LG on which phones they will be unveiling at CES 2018.

Read More: Samsung Galaxy A8+ (2018) Hands-on Video Appear Before Alleged CES 2018 Launch

The Galaxy A series phones by Samsung and K series smartphone from LG are mid-range devices. The Galaxy A8 and A8+ are rumored to arrive with some traits from the Galaxy S8 and S8+. Hence, the Galaxy A8 duo are expected to feature Infinity Display design with 18:9 aspect ratio and Bixby home button.

The A8 duo will be supporting Split View (multi-window) and Pop-Up View (picture-in-picture) features. These phones are expected to be available for buying in South Korea by mid-January.

On the other hand, the 2018 edition of the LG K10 is unlikely to arrive with a full screen design. Its 5.3-inch display is expected to deliver an aspect ratio of 16:9. The quad-core processor driving the phone will be coupled with 3 GB of RAM and 32 GB of storage. It is also expected to include LG Pay and FM Radio.

Samsung and LG will be checking the responses of the consumers for the first time in 2018 through the upcoming CES event. Hence, it is an important place for both companies. Even though the rumor mill has claimed that Samsung will be showcasing the Galaxy S9 and S9+ flagship phones behind closed doors to the investors, the publication has no information on whether the South Korean tech giant will be really doing that at CES 2018.

Other smartphone manufacturers will be using the CES 2018 stage to unveil their new phones. The event will begin on Jan. 9 and will come to an end on Jan. 12.

(source)

Source: Samsung, LG Pegged to Unveil New Mid-Range Phones at CES 2018

China's top smartphone makers are in talks with US wireless carriers

Huawei and Xiaomi, two of China's largest smartphone makers, are looking to take on Apple on its home turf.

Sources familiar with the matter tell Bloomberg the two companies are in talks with wireless carriers in the US with regard to selling their handsets to American consumers in 2018. AT&T and Verizon were mentioned specifically in the report although sources claim the talks are still "fluid" and it's possible that things could fall through entirely.

Data from Strategy Analytics shows that Apple's US smartphone market share sat at 30.4 percent in the third quarter followed closely by Samsung at 25.1 percent and LG at 17.2 percent.

As Bloomberg highlights, Huawei already sells at least one phone (the Mate 9) in the US via e-commerce sites like Amazon. By working directly with wireless carriers to get into retail stores, however, the company would gain exposure to US consumers that might not otherwise be familiar with the brand (the same goes for Xiaomi).

The Chinese smartphone manufacturers have a solid shot at making a dent in the US market. Whereas most new flagships from companies like Apple and Samsung now start around the $1,000 mark, the aforementioned Mate 9 is available on Amazon for under $400 (that's a solid price for a quality phone).

Apple, meanwhile, has struggled in China as of late and given the iPhone X's hefty price tag, things may not improve any time soon.

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Source: China's top smartphone makers are in talks with US wireless carriers

China Has a New Three-Year Plan to Rule AI

Rapid advances in AI have spawned a number of recent initiatives that aim to convince engineers, programmers, and others to prioritize ethical considerations in their work—but almost all of them have originated in rich Western countries. An effort from the huge engineering association IEEE is now trying to change that, with its own AI ethics proposal that it says will be a global, multilingual collaboration.

In the past two years alone, a raft of new efforts to explore ethics in AI have launched, including the Elon Musk–backed nonprofit OpenAI, the corporate alliance Partnership on AI, Carnegie Mellon University's AI ethics research center, and the Ethics & Society research unit at Google's AI subsidiary DeepMind.

But most of these projects are based in the U.S. or U.K., are led by a small group of researchers, and issue updates only in English, which could limit their ability to foster AI that benefits all of humanity, not just those in developed countries.

Since 2016, a group called the IEEE Global Initiative for Ethical Considerations in Artificial Intelligence and Autonomous Systems has been writing a document called "Ethically Aligned Design" that recommends societal and policy guidelines for technologies such as chatbots and home robots. This week, the group unveiled an updated version of the document that integrates feedback from people in East Asia, Latin America, the Middle East, and other regions.

Many of those comments came from members the initiative recruited from Brazil, China, Iran, Israel, Japan, Korea, Mexico, the Russian Federation, and Thailand this year. The group now numbers about 250 people worldwide and continues to grow, according to executive committee chair Raja Chatila.

These international members translated parts of the document into their native languages so it could be circulated widely within their countries, and they submitted reports about the state of AI ethics in their regions to the initiative's executive committee.

To further diversify the viewpoints, the initiative created a "classical ethics" committee to identify non-Western value systems, such as Buddhism, or Confucianism, which could be incorporated into the document's ethical guidelines. The group also solicited feedback from outreach organizations, like AI4All, that teach women and people of color about AI.

It's not yet clear how the initiative will meld these different traditions and viewpoints—the final version won't be published until 2019—but the group has some preliminary ideas. Citing the Buddhist belief that nothing exists in isolation could remind AI designers that they bear responsibility for the systems they create, for example. Similarly, teaching developers about the sub-Saharan philosophical tradition Ubuntu, which emphasizes the value of community, could prompt them to "work closely both with ethicists and the target audience to ascertain whether their needs are identified and met," according to the latest version of the document.

In spite of its earnestness, there's no guarantee the venture will produce results. Like other AI ethics guidelines in the works, "Ethically Aligned Design" just makes recommendations; it has no way of enforcing its suggestions. But growing awareness about the ways AI can discriminate against users if designers don't take diversity into account—and increasing consumer demands for accountability—point to the value of thinking globally when formulating ethical principles for AI.

Source: China Has a New Three-Year Plan to Rule AI