Saturday, April 30, 2016

Indian Smartphone market up 23%, Apple Q1 sales up 62% amidst negative growth results globally: Counterpoint Research

India smartphone market grew 23 percent in the first quarter of 2016, surpassing the US to become the second largest country in terms of users, even as sales remained flat globally, research firm Counterpoint said on Friday.

"India which surpassed US to become the second largest smartphone market in terms of users has continued to register strong demand for smartphone," Counterpoint Research Research Director Peter Richardson said.

There is a massive opportunity for every player in the mobile value chain when the second largest market by volume is still under penetrated and growing, while the rest of the world smartphone demand has waned, he added.

"India is the next China… more than a billion smartphones will be sold in India over the next five years. This will drive the number of smartphone users from quarter of a billion to more than half a billion in the same time period," he said.

Furthermore, the advent of advanced 4G LTE network infrastructure will also be a key catalyst in the country's smartphone adoption in coming years, it said.

Global smartphone shipments remained flat at 344 million units in January-March, impacted by weaker demand in China and Brazil as well as parts of Europe, as per Counterpoint.

It added that this is the first time since the launch of smartphones that the segment globally has seen no growth.

Samsung led the India smartphone tally with 29 percent share. Interestingly, Reliance Jio, which forayed into the market this quarter itself with brand Lyf, cornered 7 percent share.

"We estimate, this quarter strong shipment was more of channel filling, the actual sell-through will happen in Q2 2016 as the operator starts full-fledged marketing and promotional activity," the report said.

Lyf also became the second largest LTE phone supplier surpassing Micromax and Lenovo during January-March 2016.

Others in the list included Micromax (17 percent), Intex (10 percent) and Lenovo (8 percent) and Karbonn (5 percent).

Apple recorded a stellar 62 percent growth in the first quarter from year-ago period, though on a lower base, thus registering back-to-back sequential growth in spite of negative growth results globally for the iPhone.

In terms of overall mobile phone sales (including feature phones), Samsung led the segment with 25 percent share, followed by Micromax (14 percent), Intex (11 per cent), Lava (9 percent) and Karbonn (5 percent).

"The demand for LTE smartphones remained strong as two out of three smartphones shipped were LTE capable," Counterpoint Senior Analyst Tarun Pathak said.

PTI

Tags: 4G, Apple, Counterpoint Research, Karbonn, LTE, LYF, Micromax, Sales, Samsung, Smartphone


Source: Indian Smartphone market up 23%, Apple Q1 sales up 62% amidst negative growth results globally: Counterpoint Research

Indian smartphone market up 23 pc as global smartphone growth stalls

By PTI on Apr 30, 2016 at 1:42 PM comments Tags: Smartphones News mobile

India smartphone market grew 23 percent in the first quarter of 2016, surpassing US to become the second largest country in terms of users, even as sales remained flat globally, research firm Counterpoint said. "India which surpassed USA to become the second largest smartphone market in terms of users has continued to register strong demand for smartphones," Counterpoint Research Research Director Peter Richardson said.

There is a massive opportunity for every player in the mobile value chain when the second largest market by volume is still under penetrated and growing, while the rest of the world smartphone demand has waned, he added.

"India is the next China…more than a billion smartphones will be sold in India over the next five years. This will drive the number of smartphone users from quarter of a billion to more than half a billion in the same time period," he said. Furthermore, the advent of advanced 4G LTE network infrastructure will also be a key catalyst in the country's smartphone adoption in coming years, it said.

Global smartphone shipments remained flat at 344 million units in January-March, impacted by weaker demand in China and Brazil as well as parts of Europe, as per Counterpoint. It added that this is the first time since the launch of smartphones that the segment globally has seen no growth.

ALSO READ: Reliance Digital LYF becomes the 5th largest smartphone vendor in India within 4 months of launch: Analyst

Samsung led the India smartphone tally with 29 percent share. Interestingly, Reliance Jio, which forayed into the market this quarter itself with brand 'LYF', cornered seven percent share. "We estimate, this quarter strong shipment was more of channel filling, the actual sell-through will happen in Q2 2016 as the operator starts full-fledged marketing and promotional activity," the report said.

Lyf also became the second largest LTE phone supplier surpassing Micromax and Lenovo during January-March 2016. Others in the list included Micromax (17 percent), Intex (10 percent) and Lenovo (8 percent) and Karbonn (5 percent).

Apple recorded a stellar 62 percent growth in the first quarter from year-ago period, though on a lower base, thus registering back-to-back sequential growth in spite of negative growth results globally for iPhones.

In terms of overall mobile phone sales (including feature phones), Samsung led the segment with 25 percent share, followed by Micromax (14 percent), Intex (11 percent), Lava (9 percent) and Karbonn (5 percent). "The demand for LTE smartphones remained strong as two out of three smartphone shipped was LTE capable," Counterpoint Senior Analyst Tarun Pathak said.

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  • Source: Indian smartphone market up 23 pc as global smartphone growth stalls

    Friday, April 29, 2016

    Chinese Tech Firms Charge Into Electric Cars

    Updated April 29, 2016 6:23 a.m. ET

    In a four-story Bauhaus-style building west of Shanghai, nearly 500 engineers are working to put what they hope will be China's answer to a Tesla Motors Inc. TSLA -2.81 % electric car on the road.

    Their company, NextEV, currently doesn't have anything to sell. It plans to unveil its first electric car in 2017.

    "Our goal is to build a high-end, high-performance electric car for half the price of a Tesla car," said Li Bin, co-founder and chairman of NextEV.

    Counting Chinese Internet giant Tencent Holdings Ltd. TCEHY -1.46 % as an investor, NextEV is part of an increasingly crowded industry as the world's biggest auto market welcomes a wave of new entrants—China's deep-pocketed Internet giants. Concerned that conventional auto makers don't have what it takes to innovate, Beijing has used generous subsidies to encourage tech firms to lead the way as it struggles to cut pollution and reduce its dependence on imported energy.

    As well as attracting Internet companies, these auto startups have been backed by private equity, forged partnerships with Silicon Valley firms and hired talent from the global auto industry.

    China's industrial regulator amended rules in June last year to allow nonautomotive companies to invest in the electric car industry. "The auto industry is on the cusp of revolutionary change," said a senior executive at a state-owned auto maker, who declined to be named because he wasn't cleared to speak to media. "Beijing hopes that the Internet companies will bring innovation to the industry," he said.

    Created by Internet entrepreneurs including the founder of Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com Inc., JD -0.35 % NextEV is one of nearly a dozen Chinese auto startups that have begun operation over the past 12 months.

    Elsewhere, the country's biggest search-engine operator, Baidu.com, BIDU 4.45 % is working on a self-driving car, which it says will hit the road in five years.

    Sport-utility vehicles are currently the bright spot in a cooling Chinese auto market, but electric vehicles dominated this year's Beijing auto show. Tech and entertainment company LeEco, which is better known for its smartphones, televisions and video streaming, showcased a concept self-driving electric supercar. Features include back seats that adjust to passengers' bodies and a steering wheel that disappears in self-driving mode. It isn't clear when the car will go into production.

    LeEco Chief Executive Jia Yueting envisions a business model for his web-connected cars that would price them in a similar way to smartphones or televisions, with customers paying not so much for the hardware but for content such as TV shows, movies and other services. He sees his cars eventually being free of charge. "We are creating a new ecosystem for future mobility rather than just making a car, " he said.

    Turning these ambitions into reality will be tested by increasing competition and doubts about the sustainability of China's subsidy-fueled boom in electric vehicles, particularly following a recent government probe into several suspected instances of subsidy fraud.

    But startups say the game has changed. NextEV has struck a deal with a state-run company to help build its car. "I don't think it's difficult to build an affordable, high-end electric car, " said Mr. Li. "Electric wheel motors and battery packs aren't that complicated compared with internal-combustion engines."

    NextEV has hired more than 700 employees globally since it was formed in November 2014 and has four research centers. Its notable hires include Martin Leach, a former chief executive of Maserati, and Padmasree Warrior, former chief technology officer at Cisco Systems Inc. CSCO -1.68 %

    It has received investment from Sequoia Capital, Hillhouse Capital Group and Tencent and raised about half of the $1 billion it is targeting, said Mr. Li, adding that the remaining $500 million will be raised by the end of this year.

    Elsewhere, Future Mobility, Foxconn Technology Group 2354 -2.06 % 's joint venture with Tencent, has hired executives from BMW AG BMW -4.10 % 's i-series electric vehicle development team. LeEco has ties with California-based electric car maker Atieva and startup Faraday Future, and cooperates with state-run auto maker BAIC Motor Corp. 1958 3.48 %

    Electric vehicles in China are exempt from certain restrictions facing their gasoline-fueled counterparts. In Beijing for example, a consumer can buy an electric car and drive any day of the week, instead of being banned one day a week for a gasoline car.

    But while sales of electric and hybrid cars and buses quadrupled in 2015 from the previous year to 331,000 vehicles, it is a tiny tally in a market where total vehicle sales exceeded 24 million. The surge was largely due to China's generous subsidies for electric vehicle ownership—the future of which remain uncertain.

    Such huge government spending isn't sustainable given China's slowing economy and issues with deteriorating local government debt, some analysts say. Beijing has also made it clear that it would reduce subsidies for electric vehicles over time.

    Hou Yankun, head of China equity and Asian auto research at UBS, estimates that in 2015 China's central and local governments spent a total of 90 billion yuan, or $14 billion, in the sector, including direct cash subsidies for electric vehicle makers and construction on public charging stations. Cash subsidies account for more than 40% of an electric car's tag price, much higher than the 10% to 15% ratio in other markets, he said.

    NextEV's Mr. Li said he isn't under pressure to make fast money. "Our investors have never set the timetable about when to make a profit," he said.


    Source: Chinese Tech Firms Charge Into Electric Cars

    Chinese smartphone makers Oppo and Vivo surpass Xiaomi and Lenovo in global sales

    Chinese smartphone makers Oppo and Vivo have become the world's fourth and fifth largest vendors in terms of shipments, pushing better-known brands Lenovo and Xiaomi out of the top five.

    Oppo shipped 18.5 million smartphones during the first three months of the year, taking the fourth place after Samsung, Apple and Huawei, while Vivo rose to the fifth place with 14.3 million shipments, according to market research company IDC.

    Previously Lenovo and Xiaomi held the fourth and fifth positions, respectively.

    Both Oppo and Vivo have seen impressive growth in China, where smartphone sales have peaked and consumers are becoming increasingly sophisticated.

    Oppo's shipments in the first quarter of 2016 grew 153.2 percent from a year ago, the strongest growth among the top 5 vendors, while Vivos' shipments rose 123.8 percent year-over-year.

    IDS said that whereas Lenovo did well in China in 2013 and Xiaomi rose to success in 2014 and 2015, Huawei, Oppo and Vivo are positioned for strong growth in 2016.

    "These new vendors would be well-advised not to rest on their laurels though, as this dynamic smartphone landscape has shown to even cult brands like Xiaomi that customer loyalty is difficult to consistently maintain," Melissa Chau, senior research manager with IDC's Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, said.

    Among the fast-growing Chinese smartphone brands, only Huawei has so far been able to sell equally impressive volumes abroad as in China.

    "Outside of China, many of these brands are virtually unknown and the ability of these rapidly growing Chinese vendors to gain entry into mature markets such as the United States and Western Europe will be essential if they have aspirations of catching Apple or Samsung at the top," said Anthony Scarsella, research manager with IDC's Mobile Phone team.

    Overall, vendors shipped 334.9 million smartphones worldwide in the first quarter of 2016, up just slightly f rom 334.3 million units a year ago, marking the smallest year-over-year growth on record.

    The minimal growth was due to strong smartphone saturation in developed markets and year-over-year decline from market leaders Samsung and Apple, IDC said.  


    Source: Chinese smartphone makers Oppo and Vivo surpass Xiaomi and Lenovo in global sales

    Thursday, April 28, 2016

    Party ends for smartphones as global sales fall

    Smartphone shipments worldwide flattened out in the first quarter with just 0.2pc growth year-on-year, the smallest growth on record. Its market share declined marginally to 23.6 percent from the 24 percent it held in the same period last year, while Apple's share was down to 15.3 percent from 17.7 percent a year earlier. Both lost ground to fast-growing Chinese smartphone makers including Huawei, Oppo and Vivo.

    Apple's South Korean rival Samsung shipped 79 million smartphones worldwide in the first quarter, down 4 percent annually from 82.7 million units in the first quarter of 2015, Strategy Analytics said. The company recently released its flagship P9 smartphone and told CNBC in February that it will surpass Apple as the second-biggest smartphone player in the world in three years and leapfrog Samsung by 2021.

    The company's new Galaxy S7 and S7 edge sold "vigorously" in the month of March, while its more affordable J-series phones did well in emerging markets, according to IDC.

    The launch of the iPhone SE which has all the power of the 6S in a compact form factor could help but at $399 the SE features equally powerful competition from competitors in India and China. As Apple CEO Cook mentioned on the company's earnings call, the SE will begin having an impact on iPhone shipments in the second quarter of 2016.

    So what does all of this mean for the smartphone market?

    The drop in revenue for mainland China reached 11%. It blames the contracting market on "increased penetration maturity" in major markets such as China, along with general consumer caution about the future of the global economy.

    The biggest reason why Lenovo and Xiaomi are getting hurt is because numbers suggest the average selling price of a smartphone in China has gone up from $207 in 2013 to $257 in 2015, indicating greater purchasing power and an appetite for more premium smartphones. Xiaomi remains under pressure from Oppo, Vivo and others across Asia, while it is still very weak in North America and Western Europe, Strategy Analytics said. "These new vendors would be well-advised not to rest on their laurels though, as this dynamic smartphone landscape has shown to even cult brands like Xiaomi that customer loyalty is hard to consistently maintain".

    "As the market as a whole slows, smartphone vendors need to adjust to targeting the replacement market", Jupiter said in a statement.

    On Wednesday, research firm IDC said that smartphone makers managed to eke out a tiny gain in Q1. This increase is due to the Huawei-made Nexus 6P- Google's flagship device. While Huawei is furthest along in terms of global recognition, selling equally impressive volumes outside of China remains a challenge for many of these brands, whether it is Xiaomi, Lenovo, OPPO, or Vivo.

    Gold Inches Above $1250 As BoJ Stirs JittersThe contract rose $1.29, or 2.9 percent, to settle at $45.33 a barrel on Wednesday, which was its highest price since December. On the economic calendar, initial jobless claims are at 1330 BST, along with the first release of first-quarter US GDP.

    No Nintendo NX at E3 2016, console won't replace Wii U & 3DSSo far there are a number of awesome games for the Wii U , such as Super Mario Maker, Splatoon , and Pokken Tournament just to name a few.

    Crystal Palace 2-1 Watford"When we started the season the main target was to stay in the Premier League". But we have got players who can hurt any team. We are not happy of course with the result".


    Source: Party ends for smartphones as global sales fall

    Global smartphone shipments decline for the first time ever

    There have been troubling signs in the smartphone market for a while now, ever since China reported a decline in its shipments around a year ago. The biggest markets, including the United States, have become over-saturated, and the up and coming markets can't make up the difference.

    Now the inevitable has happened, as the global smartphone market saw its first ever year-to-year decline in Q1, according to data out from Strategy Analytics on Thursday. Shipments dropped 3 percent from the first quarter of 2015 to the first quarter of 2016, dipping from 345 million to 334.6 million.

    The signs for this type of decline have been there for a while now. There was aforementioned decline in China, which was the first such drop that the country had seen in 6 years, but global smartphone shipments had already been slowing down considerably.

    While were 1.44 billion shipments worldwide in 2015, an increase of 10.4 percent over 2014, that is very likely going to be the last year of double digit growth. Shipments are going to fall fast, as they are only expected to grow 5.7 percent in 2016, with nearly half the growth they saw in 2015.

    Another troubling sign was what happened to Apple earlier this week when it released its second quarter earnings report. Not only did the company see its revenue drop for the first time in 13 years, but it was a result of the company seeing iPhone sales slip for the first time ever. Sales dropped 16 percent year-over-year, from 61.2 million in Q1 2015 to 51.2 million in Q1 2016.

    "It is the first time ever since the modern smartphone market began in 1996 that global shipments have shrunk on an annualized basis," Linda Sui, Director at Strategy Analytics, said in a statement. "Smartphone growth is slowing due to increasing penetration maturity in major markets like China and consumer caution about the future of the world economy."

    While Samsung remains the leading smartphone vendor, it saw its shipments drop 4 percent year over year. It still has a 23.6 percent marketshare, but that too was down from 24 percent a year ago.

    Apple saw its marketshare decline 2.5 percentage points, going from 17.7 percent to 15.3 percent.

    Huawei, meanwhile, is bucking all trends with big growth from the same period last year. Its shipments skyrocketed by 64 percent, from 17.3 million to 28.3 million, sending its marketshare up 3.5 percentage points in the process. 

    OPPO also saw its numbers grow so that it's now the smartphone vendor with the fourth largest marketshare. It saw a 76 percent increase in shipments, from 8.3 million to 15.5 million, and its marketshare nearly doubled, from 2.4 percent to 4.6 percent.

    Even if the smartphone market is shrinking, that doesn't mean all companies are being taken down with it. 

    So what does all of this mean for the smartphone market? Possibly two things: bigger phones and cheaper prices

    Smartphone prices are expected to fall, according to a report from IDC last month. The aggregate market price was $295 in 2015, and by 2020 it will be $237.

    The other thing will be phones with larger screens, as Phablets, or a hybrid between a phone and tablet, which made up 20 percent of smartphone shipments last year, will be 32 percent by 2020. Apple will see its phablets, which, right now, are the iPhone 6 Plus and 6S Plus, to grow from 26 percent in 2015 to nearly 31 percent in 2020.

    So maybe this will actually wind up being a good thing for us!

    (Image source: t3.com)


    Source: Global smartphone shipments decline for the first time ever

    Wednesday, April 27, 2016

    Smartphone market sees Q1 Chinese shakeup – IDC

    While the smartphone market was essentially flat in Q1 2016, there was a change in the Chinese vendors in the top five, according to research firm IDC.

    While the top three places remained unchanged – Samsung, Apple and Huawei – Oppo and Vivo took fourth and fifth places, displacing Lenovo and Xiaomi.

    "These new vendors would be well-advised not to rest on their laurels though, as this dynamic smartphone landscape has shown to even cult brands like Xiaomi that customer loyalty is difficult to consistently maintain," Melissa Chau, senior research manager, said.

    Oppo has been in the smartphone game since 2011, and is primarily focused on China, although since 2012 it has been shipping to other markets in Asia, Middle East and Africa.

    The company's efforts are centred on "fostering channel partnerships, supplemented with large marketing budgets and entertainment sponsorships to increase visibility", IDC said.

    Vivo has also offered smartphones since 2011, but is focused more on its home market (less than 10 per cent of 2015 volume was outside China).

    It is positioned as "relatively premium", and "slightly differentiated by its focus on audio", IDC said.

    Of the more familiar brands, Huawei saw continued growth, as it looked to compete both in premium devices and, through its Honor brand, at the entry level.

    "In China, Huawei is already recognised as a premium brand, but it is now going toe-to-toe on build quality with premium devices like the Nexus 6P that are available worldwide. While Huawei is furthest along in terms of international recognition, selling equally impressive volumes outside of China remains a challenge for many of these brands, whether it is Xiaomi, Lenovo, Oppo, or Vivo," Anthony Scarsella, research manager at IDC, said.

    Samsung retained top spot despite a slight (0.6 per cent) decline in shipments year-on-year. IDC said that the Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge sold "vigorously" in March, aided by operator promotions, while the more affordable J-series is picking up buyers in emerging markets.

    Second-placed Apple saw its first drop in iPhone models, as current owners opted not to upgrade to iPhone 6s at the same rate as for last year's iteration. The company's lower-cost iPhone SE is now available.

    IDC table


    Source: Smartphone market sees Q1 Chinese shakeup – IDC

    Samsung remains smartphone leader as Apple struggles

    montenegro-021-013.jpg

    The Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge helped Samsung retain first place in the global smartphone market.

    Josh Miller/CNET

    Samsung saw a slight dip in smartphone shipments last quarter but was still top dog thanks to demand for its Galaxy S7 lineup.

    For the first quarter of 2016, Samsung shipped 81.9 million phones, down slightly from 82.4 million in the same quarter last year, research firm IDC said on Wednesday. The decline would've been larger if not for the success of Samsung's new Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge. The new Galaxy phones "sold vigorously" during March, according to IDC, helped by promotions from wireless carriers.

    Apple saw a larger drop in smartphone sales, to 51.2 million last quarter from 61.2 million in the same period in 2015. The iPhone maker was hit by its first year-over-year descent in smartphone shipments as the lack of new features on the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus may have dissuaded many iPhone owners from upgrading.

    Smartphone ownership has reached a saturation point in key markets across the world. With only small improvements in each new generation of phones, the major players are finding it more difficult to tempt smartphone owners to jump to new models.

    More Chinese vendors are bucking the trend of slowing smartphone demand by hawking low-cost and premium-priced devices.

    China's Huawei took third place last quarter behind Samsung and Apple by selling 27.5 million phones, up from 17.4 million in the year-ago quarter. The company focused on both premium and entry-level phones, not just in China but in major markets across Europe, according to IDC.

    Two new Chinese vendors made the top five list, stealing spots from Xiaomi and Lenovo.

    Oppo sold 18.5 million phones last quarter, up from just 7.3 million in the prior year. The company has recently been expanding from its home base of China to Asia, the Middle East and Africa. In fifth place, Vivo sold 14.3 million phones, up from 6.4 million over the same period. Unlike Oppo, Vivo sells mainly in China yet has also reached out to con sumers in Southeast Asia and India.

    But the Chinese vendors are still small fries compared with the likes of Samsung and Apple.

    "Outside of China, many of these brands are virtually unknown," IDC research manager Anthony Scarsella said in a statement, adding that they'll have to crack markets like Europe and the United States if they want to take on Apple and Samsung.


    Source: Samsung remains smartphone leader as Apple struggles

    Tuesday, April 26, 2016

    Lenovo's Vibe K5 Smartphone Goes Up For Pre-Order In Europe

    Chinese smartphone major Lenovo, in a surprise movement announced to slash the prices of Vibe S1 phone.

    When the phone launched as an exclusive for Amazon.in a year ago it was priced at Rs. 15,999 and it has since generated a good amount of interest. Following the official presentation, the duo was released in China, and later in March 2016 the Lenovo Vibe K5 Plus became available for pre-order in India.

    The company made the announcement in a tweet by its India Twitter handle on Monday.

    The New Lenovo Vibe S1 Smartphone, which claims to be world's first Smartphone with dual selfie camera.

    The USP of VIBE S1 is its feature of dual selfie cameras - the 8MP primary front camera and a 2MP secondary front camera which analyzes depth of field information to replicate human binocular vision.

    The highlight of this device is its aluminum frame and the curved glass back with a glossy finish. Lenovo Vibe S1 smartphone features a 5-inch full-HD (1080x1920) display and runs on Android 5.0 (Lollipop).

    Lenovo Vibe K5 can be purchased in Greece through the company's Lenvo Exclusive website in Sliver or Gold body colors. The main camera at the rear is a 13-megapixel variety and the handset is nicely slim at 7.8mm.

    The handset also sports several built-in photo editing tools such as Blur, which allows refocusing anywhere on the selfie (up to 3 focal plains), and Cut Out, which allows users to cut out people from a selfie and then superimpose them on another image. It's powered by a 1.7GHz octa-core 64-bit MediaTek MT6752 processor paired with 3GB RAM. It comes with 32 GB in-built storage which can be expanded upto 128GB using MicroSD card. The device will be available in Pearl White and Midnight Blue colour options.


    Source: Lenovo's Vibe K5 Smartphone Goes Up For Pre-Order In Europe

    China takes top spot in iOS app downloads — and jumps to 2nd in total App Store revenue

    China just beat Japan to take second position for global revenue from iPhone and iPad apps, a new report says.

    The U.S. is still the king of iOS app revenue generation in Q1 2016, according to App Annie (PDF link). However, China's snapping at its heels, with a 2.2 times growth year-on-year that made it move up a notch since January.

    In terms of the sheer number of app downloads, China took the top spot last year, overtaking the U.S. That's thanks to China's huge number of smartphone owners as well as Apple's big screen iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, say the App Annie analysts.

    But as any startup will tell you, getting people to download apps and making money off them are two different things.

    In the first quarter of 2016, despite China getting close to "peak smartphone," the rate of revenue growth accelerated year over year — up from 2 times growth in Q1 2015.

    But all of that is still not enough to match in-app spending in the United States, which maintains a 30 percent lead on China for total iOS App Store revenue. This is because more users are willing to pay for app services like Netflix and Spotify as well as making other in-app purchases.

    App Annie expects worldwide app store downloads across all OSes to grow 33 percent to 147.3 billion in 2016, driven largely by smartphone adoption in emerging markets.

    In the first quarter, Vietnam experienced the fastest year-over-year percentage growth (1.7 times) in Android app downloads from Google Play from Q1 2015. It also ranked second in market share growth, the report said. Games contributed to half of the growth of Google Play downloads in the country.

    Argentina and Egypt followed, with 1.4 times growth each.

    However, India led global trends on overall year-on-year market share growth for Google Play, outstripping Vietnam.


    Source: China takes top spot in iOS app downloads — and jumps to 2nd in total App Store revenue

    Monday, April 25, 2016

    Start up: China’s coming smartphone crash, Boston Globe v readers, Google Glass is back!, and more

    A bucket with ice water: much cheaper, though it doesn't have Bluetooth. Photo by mediadeo on Flickr.

    You can now sign up to receive each day's Start Up post by email. You'll need to click a confirmation link, so no spam. (If you signed up and didn't receive, please let me know in the comments here.)

    A selection of 9 links for you. They are what they are. I'm charlesarthur on Twitter. Observations and links welcome.

    Dark patterns by the Boston Globe » The Rationalist Conspiracy

    Alyssa Vance:

    »After years of falling revenue, some newspapers have resorted to deception to boost their subscription numbers. These dishonest tactics are sometimes called "dark patterns" – user interfaces designed to trick people.

    For example, this is a Boston Globe story on Bernie Sanders:

    Before you can read the article, there is a pop-up ad asking you to subscribe. By itself, this is annoying, but not deceptive. The real dark pattern is hidden at the top – the 'Close' button (circled in red) uses a very low contrast font, making it hard to see. It's also in the left corner, not the standard right corner. This makes it likely that users won't see it, causing them to subscribe when they didn't have to.

    One the 'Close' link is clicked, deception continues:

    At the bottom, there's a non-removable, high-contrast banner ad asking for a paid subscription. Again, this is annoying, but honest. However, the circled text "for only 99 cents per week" is not honest. It's simply a lie, as later pages will show.

    «

    Turns out that 99c is actually $6.93 per week, and you can only unsubscribe by phone. So wicked.link to this extract

    The blockchain menu » net.wars

    Wendy Grossman:

    »The Internet of Things is such an established concept that I'm startled to note that week's (Lego) prototype was my first. Three cars want to park…somewhere. Their owners have preset the maximum they will pay. The system locates the nearest parking space, and they bid. The winner is directed to the space, and the fee is automatically deducted from the car's balance. A display showed the auction in real time. All very nice until I injected reality by grabbing a car and plunking it in the space before bidding ended.

    "Usurped" the contested space was now tagged. "You'll be fined," Consult Hyperion's demonstrator said. Who will that stop in Manhattan, where friends have missed two successive movie showings because no parking space? This may be an entertaining solution wishing for a problem.

    In that, it was not alone at this week's Tomorrow's Transactions Forum, Dave Birch's quirky annual event where ideas about the future of money are smashed together like particles to see what happens.

    «

    I love the idea of app developers thinking people would be well-behaved and wait for their app to tell them where to park, while Noo Yawkers just PARK THE DAMN CAR THERE IN THE STOOPID SPACE.

    But the article is actually about blockchains, which in a similar way are mostly a solution in search of a problem.link to this extract

    China's crowded smartphone market heads for an epic shakeout » Bloomberg

    David Ramli:

    »The startup Dakele looked pretty smart when it released a phone in China four years ago. The market was doubling annually, and the company put brand-name components inside a device that cost a fraction of the iPhone.

    That $160 gadget went on sale just four months after Dakele opened its doors, and soon the company, which translates as "Big Cola," made inroads against Huawei Technologies Co. and Xiaomi Corp. Buzz was building for the Dakele 3 model last year, with online reviews calling it the best Apple Inc. clone.

    Then the sizzle started to fizzle. Huawei spent $300 million on marketing, Xiaomi cut prices and clones of the clone appeared. Troubles with a supplier and raising money prompted Dakele to shut down last month—and it likely won't be alone. China's herd of 300 phone makers may be halved in 12 months by competition, a sales plateau and economic growth that's the slowest in a quarter-century, according to executives and analysts.

    "The mobile-phone industry changed more quickly and brutally than expected," Dakele Chief Executive Officer Ding Xiuhong said on his Weibo messaging account. "As a startup, we couldn't find more strategies and methods to break through."

    «

    I can't decide whether the smartphone market is telescoping a decade of the PC market into two years, or just going through the same as happened in 1985-9 in about the same length of time.link to this extract

    Kickstarter's biggest shitshow somehow got even messier » Motherboard

    Jaason Koebler:

    »A decidedly not chill development for 36,000 Kickstarter backers of the "Coolest Cooler": Coolest is now considering asking people who haven't yet received their coolers to pay an additional $97 for "expedited delivery" of the long-past-due all-in-one disaster, a prospect that has allegedly led some backers to threaten Coolest employees.

    If you're not familiar, at the time it launched, the Coolest Cooler was the most popular Kickstarter of all time, raising $13 million. The 55-quart cooler has a built-in blender, a waterproof Bluetooth speaker, a USB charger, and a bottle opener. You can buy one on Amazon, right now, and have it by the weekend if you pay $399.99.

    That $399.99 price point is important—when Coolest Cooler was launched on Kickstarter, it cost between $165 and $225, a price its creator Ryan Grepper said in an update to backers was far too low…

    …Coolest Cooler doesn't have money to produce the remaining coolers, which is why it's selling existing stock on Amazon but not sending them to backers who haven't yet received the product (the company has delivered about 20,000 coolers to backers, but 36,000 more people are waiting). Reviews of the cooler are mixed — most say that it is indeed cool, but that it is very heavy and isn't worth $400.

    «

    I'm trying to imagine a cooler that would be worth $400, even with those add-ons. The article's comparison with the Welsh drone screwup Zano isn't right, though; Zano had absurdly inflated claims. This is just poor pricing.link to this extract

    CDC: two of every five U.S. households have only wireless phones » Pew Research Center

    »More Americans than ever have cut the (telephone) cord, but the growth rate of wireless-only households slowed last year.

    About two-in-five (41%) of U.S. households had only wireless phones in the second half of 2013, according to a report released today by the National Center for Health Statistics. The center, the statistical arm of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, estimated that 39.1% of adults and 47.1% of children lived in wireless-only households.

    «

    When I noted yesterday that "call mom" had overtaken "call home" as a Google search (hence almost certainly a voice activation), I thought it was because "mom" was likely to be at home. But as was pointed out, there might not be a "home" to call.

    (Next up: can we calculate the divorce rate based on the rise of "call mom" v "call dad"?)link to this extract

    Google Glass startup Augmedix raises $17m from healthcare orgs » Re/code

    Mark Bergen:

    »The next time you spot a Google Glass in the wild, it might not be on the face of a fervid techie. It might be on your doctor.

    Augmedix, one of several startups that formed around the computerized headgear — and kept spinning after the search giant ditched its first attempt — is raising a fresh round of capital to get Google Glass into more health care facilities. The four-year-old startup is part of a wave of Silicon Valley companies trying to tap the massive medical market. It primarily builds software for wearable devices that display electronic health records so that doctors can access them hands-free.

    "They're engaging with patients in front of them," said CEO Ian Shakil. "In the background, we're doing all the burdensome work."

    He's not raising cash from Sand Hill Road. Instead, the $17m strategic investment comes from a quintet of medical institutions.

    «

    I always thought that Glass's best use would be inside businesses, not among consumers.link to this extract

    Apple's Watch outpaced the iPhone in first year » WSJ

    Daisuke Wakabayashi:

    »Apple doesn't disclose sales, but analysts estimate about 12m Watches were sold in year one. At an estimated average price of $500, that is a $6bn business—three times the annual revenue of activity tracker Fitbit Inc.

    By comparison, Apple sold roughly 6m iPhones in its first year. As a new entrant, the Watch accounted for about 61% of global smartwatch sales last year, according to researcher IDC.

    And yet, there are detractors such as Fred Wilson, co-founder of venture-capital firm Union Square Ventures, in December declared the Watch a "flop." Mr. Wilson, who owns shares of Fitbit through a fund, had earlier predicted the Watch wouldn't be a "home run" like the iPad, iPhone and iPod, saying many people wouldn't want to wear a computer on their wrist.

    The Watch has shortcomings. It is slow, with an underpowered processor that is throttled at times to extend the device's battery life. It lacks mobile and Global Positioning System connections, meaning it must be accompanied by an iPhone, limiting its usefulness as an independent device. The battery needs to be charged every day.

    Perhaps the biggest challenge is the Watch's lack of a defining purpose. It does certain things well, such as activity tracking, mobile payments and notifications. But there is no task the Apple Watch handles that can't be done by an iPhone or a less-expensive activity tracker.

    «

    The comparison with the first-year iPhone is meaningless – the Watch was released in more places, with more fanfare. Fred Wilson's criticism, well, would the better metric be what proportion of devices are still in use? How would the Watch do against the Fitbit?

    As to "defining purpose" – its purpose so far is to be an adjunct. It does that pretty well; satisfaction is high, according to survey firm Wristly.link to this extract

    Exclusive: Bangladesh Bank hackers compromised SWIFT software, warning to be issued » Reuters

    Jim Finkle:

    »The attackers who stole $81m from the Bangladesh central bank probably hacked into software from the SWIFT financial platform that is at the heart of the global financial system, said security researchers at British defense contractor BAE Systems.

    SWIFT, a cooperative owned by 3,000 financial institutions, confirmed to Reuters that it was aware of malware targeting its client software. Its spokeswoman Natasha Deteran said SWIFT would release on Monday a software update to thwart the malware, along with a special warning for financial institutions to scrutinize their security procedures.

    The new developments now coming to light in the unprecedented cyber-heist suggest that an essential lynchpin of the global financial system could be more vulnerable than previously understood to hacking attacks, due to the vulnerabilities that enabled attackers to modify SWIFT's client software.

    «

    Got in via a poorly secured $10 router, got away with $81m, hacked the software the world's banks rely on. This could be worse, right?link to this extract

    The secret rules of the internet » The Verge

    Catherine Buni and Soraya Chemaly, with a (quite astoundingly) long piece about the history of content moderation on social networks – if by "history" you mean "starting in 2004":

    »When Dave Willner arrived at Facebook in 2008, the team there was working on its own "one-pager" of cursory, gut-check guidelines. "Child abuse, animal abuse, Hitler," Willner recalls. "We were told to take down anything that makes you feel bad, that makes you feel bad in your stomach." Willner had just moved to Silicon Valley to join his girlfriend, then Charlotte Carnevale, now Charlotte Willner, who had become head of Facebook's International Support Team. Over the next six years, as Facebook grew from less than 100 million users to well over a billion, the two worked side by side, developing and implementing the company's first formal moderation guidelines.

    "We were called The Ninjas," he said, "mapping the rabbit hole." Like Mora-Blanco, Willner described how he, Charlotte, and their colleagues sometimes laughed about their work, so that they wouldn't cry. "To outsiders, that sounds demented," he said.

    Just like at YouTube, the subjectivity of Facebook's moderation policy was glaring. "Yes, deleting Hitler feels awesome," Willner recalls thinking. "But, why do we delete Hitler? If Facebook is here to make the world more open," he asked himself, "why would you delete anything?" The job, he says, was "to figure out Facebook's central why."

    For people like Dave and Charlotte Willner, the questions are as complex now as they were a decade ago. How do we understand the context of a picture? How do we assign language meaning? Breaking the code for context — nailing down the ineffable question of why one piece of content is acceptable but a slight variation breaks policy — remains the holy grail of moderation.

    «

    One could pick out any part of this piece. It's interesting all through. The trouble is it's so long (around 2,500 words) that you may struggle to find its thread, because there isn't an actual, progressing, story.link to this extract

    Errata, corrigenda and ai no corrida: none notified.


    Source: Start up: China's coming smartphone crash, Boston Globe v readers, Google Glass is back!, and more

    Some Smartphones Among List Of Items Banned For Import From China #ChinaKaMaal

    Now India has banned import of certain mobile phones among a host of similar items from China after finding them sub-standard or not following security codes.

    Some Chinese smartphones banned in India

    siliconindia

    Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitharaman revealed this while speaking in Lok Sabha. She said that some mobile phones, which do not carry International Mobile Station Equipment Identity number or other security features, and some steel products have been banned for importing from China.

    Some Chinese smartphones banned in India

    indiatoday

    "Complete ban of import from any country is not possible now due to WTO rules even if we have problems diplomatically, territorially or militarily," she said.

    The Minister said India's trade deficit with China stood at $48.68 billion during 2015-16 (April-February) and the total bilateral trade was $65.16 billion during the period.

    "Increasing trade deficit with China can be attributed primarily to the fact that Chinese exports to India rely strongly on manufactured items to meet the demand of fast expanding sectors like telecom and power, while India's exports to China are characterized by primarily and intermediate products," she said.

    With PTI inputs


    Source: Some Smartphones Among List Of Items Banned For Import From China #ChinaKaMaal

    Sunday, April 24, 2016

    Russia's YotaPhone targets Chinese 'trend setters'

    Russia's YotaPhone targets Chinese 'trend setters'

    Vladislav Martynov, founder and chief executive officer of Yota Devices.[Provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

    The cut-throat competition in Chinese smartphone market has never frightened newcomers, but for exotic startups, the journey of starting from scratch and raising funds for expansion is tough. But a Russian company has managed to surprise the market.

    YotaPhone 2, a dual-screen smartphone manufactured by Yota Devices, started to ship in China last May. The company entered the market with a simple belief: Turning early adaptors to loyal followers was far more important than getting entangled in fighting for market share and shipment volume.

    "China is the biggest market for YotaPhone 2, and more than half of our revenue should come from the nation," said Vladislav Martynov, founder and chief executive officer of Yota Devices.

    One and a half years ago, before the China launch of the brand's flagship, Martynov met with about 20 Chinese investors and funding institutions who would go on to show interest in supporting the distribution of YotaPhone in the country.

    By knowing more about the brand and the Russian technology startup, investors' appetite is growing.

    Rex Global Entertainment Holdings Ltd, a Hong Kong-listed company, announced on April 22 its plan to purchase 30 percent stake of Yota Devices.

    How it all began

    The story of YotaPhone started in 2010 when Martynov, the Russian IT businessman who used to be a vice-president at Microsoft headquarters, was bored and looking for a new interesting project.

    He received a proposal from an old friend, Denis Sverdlov, to invent and design the first Russian smartphone.

    According to the company, at that time, nobody in Russia was able to build from the scratch not only just a smartphone, but a truly innovative one.

    The next six months were spent finding a suitable idea for the new smartphone, for which Martynov was supposed to develop a detailed plan on how to build a global business based on this product idea.

    Among dozens of options discussed inside the team for the future gadget, it was decided to choose both the most interesting and the most complicated in implementation -- the smartphone with the second screen designed on the basis of electronic ink technology.

    This solution provided an opportunity to have a device with a screen that is always active and shows the content required by the customer or the most frequently updated information.

    Russia's YotaPhone targets Chinese 'trend setters'

    The Yota Phone 2, a double screen Android-based smartphone, is pictured in Helsinki January 29, 2015. [Photo/Agencies]

    To create the smartphone from a green field, establishing its production and build international sales, Martynov found investors to provided $30 million to the team in order to start the project and make YotaPhone1.

    The most important task was to build a team of software and hardware engineers who could design and develop quite unique and innovative devices, and seeking experience software team in Moscow was relatively easy while to find experts in hardware was a real challenge.

    Quite by accident -- Martynov admitted that he does not remember who gave him the piece of advice – he decided to search for specialists in small Finnish town Ulu, where Nokia had one of its research centers. Before this, Martynov searched specialists in large cities of Finland and Canada.

    He went to Ulu and on the evening of his arrival, he went to a local café to have dinner. While planning meetings for the next day, he listened to the conversation at the next table. There were seven Finns, discussing Microsoft, the destiny of Nokia and their job positions there.

    As it turned out, it was the local research team of Nokia in full force – seven persons, each was a very high level expert in his field, from ID-design to antenna development. They refused Microsoft's offer to move on to the US, which resulted in their dismissal from Nokia.

    The next day all of them became Yota employees, they liked the idea of creating something that no one else had – a smartphone with two screens.

    These seven Finns, who still live and work in Ulu, remain the backbone of the team that together with Vlad to prepar YotaPhone 3 for the Chinese market.

    It was a success, but not the most important one, as Martynov's colleagues admit.

    They had to negotiate with suppliers of components. The smartphone would not have happened without Qualcomm chipsets, "e-INK" electronic ink screens and Samsung main screens.

    It was vital to the project to become partners with all three companies and Martynov somehow within about a year succeeded to catch their interest in collaborating with an unknown manufacturer startup from Russia.

    He shifted to Singapore for six months to personally work all the details of gadget assembling process when it was critical to start production of the second YotaPhone version in due time.

    Russia's YotaPhone targets Chinese 'trend setters'

    CEO of YotaPhone Devices Vladislav Martynov (left) with founder of China's Alibaba Group Jack Ma (right) at a round-table discussion of Chinese and Russian enterprises in Wuzhen, East China's Zhejiang province, Dec 16, 2015. [Zhu Xingxin/China Daily]

    Finally, he was in person involved in the negotiations with major operators and distributors, building personal relationships with key suppliers of components, developing the advertising campaign.

    According to Martynov, the company started to prepare for expansion in China a few months before Russian President Vladimir Putin visited China and presented a YotaPhone 2 to President Xi Jinping as a state gift in November 2014.

    At the beginning, he started the business development by hiring a Hong Kong-based talent who understood the Chinese market and was able to formulate business plans.

    Then the company decided to localize the product, so that YotaPhone would be available for the Long-Term Evolution (LTE) band in China, and partnered with Chinese content providers to produce Chinese applications available on the second screen.

    "We changed user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) designs for the E-ink display to make it more user-friendly for Chinese consumers," said Martynov. "By entering a new market with a completely new device, we decided to pick up one or two provinces to sell a small quantity of products to test market feedbacks well as gradually adding our online channel partners."

    According to Martynov, before spending money on marketing or distribution activities, the company had to understand the market first, and he believed that the best way to fast understand the market was to do a soft launch.

    Then they started to look for distributors and sales channel partners, such as JD.com and Tmall.com. Eventually the company picked up one relatively small company called JieLan Ltd, which is based in Hangzhou, and has a strong relationship with China Unicom in a certain provinces and regions, particularly in Hangzhou.

    Some small retailers from Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen, who sell consumer electronics products in physical stores, approached them and asked for permission to sell the device.

    The company responded positively and Martynov said that among the entire supply of the devices sold in China, some are contributed by the small retailers.

    What to expect from Yota Phone 3

    Due to technology limitations, by comparing with the LED or OLED display that being used in most of the smartphones hit on the market, the second screen display is noticeably slower than the front one.

    Martynov explained that it is the reason YotaPhone presents two displays in one device. In some cases, when the user needs speed, they shift to the main screen.

    "In the next version of YotaPhone, the performance of the E-ink display will be improved, and will not be substantially better but a certain percent faster than the previous generation," Martynov said.

    In addition, by making assessments of the technology and business potential, the company has been talking with several operating system (OS) providers, including Alibaba, to discuss the future possibility to make customized Android system for the future phones.

    "There is no specific plan at the moment as business cases that are beneficial for both sides should understand before the company makes a decision to invest in this," Martynov said. "We will minimally customize the system in a certain number of specific target areas where we believe the native Android system is inconvenient for users, during the launch of the next generation before the New Year."

    Wu Xiaofeng, an analyst with market research institute GfK China, pointed out that smartphone innovation has been driven by the demand of users' groups and the requirements are subdivided due to the differences in age, gender, occupation and personal preference.

    "The differences between the user groups will have deep influence on the development of the consumer electronics devices," said Wu. "The first five years' development in the smartphone industry has been passively powered by hardware upgrades that follow Moore's Law, (which observed in 1965 by Gordon Moore, co-founder of Intel, claimed that over the history of computing hardware, the number of transistors in a dense integrated circuit has doubled approximately every two years) telecom carries' policy amendments and the boom of e-commerce."

    The future mainstream consumers for smartphones will be 239 million young people who were born between 1995 and 2010.

    According to Wu, the existing brands, including Smartisan, OnePlus and YotaPhone, that are sold in the Chinese market are some of the devices that represent the industry's R&D for feeding segment user's demands.

    "YotaPhone currently targets a niche segment of the market. Thus, we do not expect shipments to be very high," said Xiaohan Tay, senior market analyst with consulting company IDC's Asia/Pacific Client Devices Group.

    According to Tay, for brands such as Smartisan and OnePlus, as well as YotaPhone, it is becoming harder for them to compete with the bigger Chinese players who are more aggressive with good products and have been spending more on marketing.

    "This brand is designed for people who want to be different and to become trend setters," Martynov said.

    By likening the phone to the first generation of iPhones that launched eight years ago, Martynov said that "people wanted to buy iPhone because it was different and a product that seems like from the future".

    The company's China team has risen to 40 people, with headquarters in Shenzhen and a subsidiary office in Beijing for business development, Martynov said.

    This year, after closing the deal with Rex, the company plans to extend its design and development teams, such as hiring a UI designer and software engineers in China.


    Source: Russia's YotaPhone targets Chinese 'trend setters'

    China's crowded smartphone market heads for an epic shakeout

    The startup Dakele looked pretty smart when it released a phone in China four years ago. The market was doubling annually, and the company put brand-name components inside a device that cost a fraction of the iPhone.

    That $160 gadget went on sale just four months after Dakele opened its doors, and soon the company, which translates as "Big Cola," made inroads against Huawei Technologies and Xiaomi Corp. Buzz was building for the Dakele 3 model last year, with online reviews calling it the best Apple clone.

    Then the sizzle started to fizzle. Huawei spent $300 million on marketing, Xiaomi cut prices and clones of the clone appeared. Troubles with a supplier and raising money prompted Dakele to shut down last month-and it likely won't be alone.

    China's herd of 300 phone makers may be halved in 12 months by competition, a sales plateau and economic growth that's the slowest in a quarter-century, according to executives and analysts.

    "The mobile-phone industry changed more quickly and brutally than expected," Dakele Chief Executive Officer Ding Xiuhong said on his Weibo messaging account. "As a startup, we couldn't find more strategies and methods to break through."

    Smartphone sales in China exploded earlier this decade as incomes rose, prices for chips and displays plummeted, and carriers offered arrays of discounts. Shelves were flooded with hundreds of brands-from national heavyweights Huawei, Lenovo and Xiaomi to the smaller Dakele, Tecno Mobile and Gionee.

    Shipments more than doubled in each of the three years ending 2012, according to researcher Canalys. Xiaomi's valuation rocketed to $45 billion, and the phone maker started selling devices in India, the world's fastest-growing major economy. Lenovo Group Ltd. spent $2.91 billion to acquire Motorola Mobility to help make it "a global player."

    In 2011, only four of the top 10 vendors in China were domestic. Last year, there were eight.

    Now that wave has crested. Smartphones no longer are novelties in China, and most domestic brands target the mid- and low-price ranges, where buyers don't upgrade as frequently as those for high-end Apple and Samsung Electronics phones.

    Jack Ding has been selling phones and accessories in his shop on Beijing's Third Ring Road for about two years. He has about 20 different models on display, predominantly local brands such as Huawei, Lenovo and ZTE. Yet they're not moving that well.

    "I don't count on selling phones to make money," he said. During a 20-minute stretch, only one customer came in-to buy a 120-yuan ($18.50) memory card.

    China's economy also stalled, with last year's growth retreating to its slowest rate since 1990. China smartphone sales last year grew by 2 percent-the lowest ever recorded by Canalys. In 2011, that rate was 150 percent. The cumulative effect may be that about half of all Chinese vendors get swamped, said James Yan, an Beijing-based analyst at Counterpoint Research.

    "The market will consolidate to about 150," Yan said. "Some small players will survive but many, like Dakele, will go bankrupt."

    As the smaller manufacturers are being winnowed, the bigger ones are expanding their share of the market. China's top two brands-Xiaomi and Huawei-owned a combined 30 percent of the market last year, compared with Apple and Samsung's 22 percent.

    "It's becoming a tough market even for tier-one players like Huawei or Xiaomi because it's hitting saturation," said CK Lu, a Taiwan-based analyst at Gartner Inc. "In order to face that market saturation, they're expanding into the lower tiers that were owned by the smaller brands."

    Xiaomi shipped just 181,000 smartphones in China in 2011. Last year, it led the market with 64.9 million shipments, according to Canalys.

    Huawei saw its shipments multiply by almost seven times to 63 million units during the same period. The Shenzhen, China-based company invested $1 billion in research and development for smartphones last year.

    "We've been seeing and predicting consolidation in the Chinese market for some time now," said Joe Kelly, a spokesman. "You have to be able to develop the phone to differentiate from others. Otherwise, you're just another 'Me, too' provider."

    The Dakele 3 was aiming to be the next Xiaomi Mi4 or Huawei Mate. It had a sapphire-coated screen, Sony Corp. image sensor and MediaTek Inc. processor for $230-about a third the price of a basic iPhone 6. The company, which operated in the Tianjin Airport Economic Area, had more than 1 million online followers.

    "The failure of our venture broke our hearts," Ding said in his posting. Dakele's website was taken down, and Ding wouldn't answer questions when contacted through calls and text messages.

    Shenzhen-based OnePlus couldn't keep up with the copycats, so it cut staff in China and switched focus overseas, including in the United Kingdom, where it recently hired six executives.

    "It seemed like at one point all the smartest Chinese entrepreneurs were starting their own smartphone companies," said Carl Pei, a OnePlus co-founder. "We had to invest a lot to break through the noise."

    Pei predicted the number of domestic vendors will shrink during the next five years.

    "There will be a handful of players in China and a handful of players globally, with some overlap," he said.

    For many of the vendors that do survive, their strategies often center on going abroad. Xiaomi has 3.2 percent of the India market, compared with Apple's 0.9 percent, according to Bloomberg Intelligence.

    Africa is another destination for China's smartphone makers, including Transission Holdings, which is Africa's most popular vendor with 8,000 employees and brands including Tecno Mobile, Itel Mobile and Infinix Mobility.

    The excessive competition in China prompted the move, said Jason Liu, chief marketing officer. Instead of aspiring to be a premium brand, Transission is content occupying the mid-priced shelves.

    The company has 2,600 employees in Africa and expects to ship about 80 million devices this year, with about 35 percent of them being smartphones. Transission also will start selling products in India by the end of this month.


    Source: China's crowded smartphone market heads for an epic shakeout

    Saturday, April 23, 2016

    ZTE Launched Nubia Z11 Mini Smartphone in China

    Tech

    ZTE Launched Nubia Z11 Mini Smartphone in China

    There is no information yet if the ZTE Nubia Z11 Mini smartpphone will be available anywhere else, but it will be out in China before this month ends for the price of CNY 1,500 (USD $230).(Photo : YouTube)

    Chinese smartphone manufacturer ZTE officially launched its newest device called the Nubia Mini Smartphone in China for 1,500 yuan (USD $230). The Nubia Z11 Mini smartphone is the light version of the Nubia Z11 smartphone that was recently announced in the region this year.

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    ZTE is one of the top Chinese smartphone manufacturers in the mobile market today. The company is currently on the Top 5 slot rankings in the United Stated along with Huawei and Xiaomi. The Chinese company introduced a new smartphone earlier this year under the Nubia series, which officially known as the Nubia Z11 Mini smartphone.

    This latest model of the Nubia flagship comes with a 5-inch 1080p display screen topped with a 2.5D glass and an impressive 16-megapixel main camera with a Sony IMX298 sensor. The main camera of this device features a 3D noise reduction, f/2.0 lens, and phase-detection autofocus. The sensor is similar to the one used in Huawei Mate 8, Vivo Xplay 5, and Xiaomi Mi 5, which is capable of RAW DNT shooting and up to 1080p of video recording.

    What makes this device more interesting is that the camera is equipped with a 12800 ISO. In addition, the 8-megapixel front-facing camera features 1.4µm pixels, 80° lens, and f/2.4 aperture suitable for a very clearer selfie images and video calls.

    ZTE Nubia Z11 Mini smartphone runs the Android 5.1 Lollipop operating system with Nubia UI 3.9 on top and is powered by a Snapdragon 617 processor coupled with Adreno 405 GPU. The device comes with a 3GB of RAM on board and a built-in 64GB internal memory storage. The handset also supports fingerprint scanning, VoLTE and dual SIM. The handheld device is fueled by a 2800mAh capacity battery.

    Meanwhile, there is no information yet if the ZTE Nubia Z11 Mini smartphone will be available anywhere else, but it will be out in China before this month ends for the price of CNY 1,500 (USD $230).

    ©2016 Chinatopix All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission


    Source: ZTE Launched Nubia Z11 Mini Smartphone in China

    LeEco Le 2 Announced, First Smartphone Without 3.5mm Headphone Port

    LeEco, the Chinese company previously called LeTV, has released three new smartphones in the LeEco Le 2 range, all without a 3.5mm headphone port.

    The new devices are called Le 2, Le 2Pro and the Le Max2. All of these smartphones feature an all metal build and look similar to several other all metal smartphones of today. The devices were announced at a launch event in China.

    It has been rumored that the iPhone 7 would be the first smartphone to get rid of the standard 3.5mm headphone port, but things have changed. The first smartphones to not use the proprietary port are the new Le 2 range from LeEco and they run Android.

    The LeEco Le 2 is the most basic of all the three models, but still packs some good hardware. It has a full HD 1080p 5.5-inch display, a deca-core MediaTek Helio X20 chipset coupled with 3GB of RAM, 32GB of internal storage, a 16-megapixel camera and an 8-megapixel front facing camera. All of this is powered by a 3,000 mAh battery.

    T he LeEco Le 2 Pro has the same display size and resolution at 5.5 inches. However, the phone features the powerful deca-core Helio x25 processor along with 4GB of RAM. A 21 megapixel Sony IMX230 camera is at the back, and there's an 8-megapixel shooter at the front. You also get 32GB of internal storage and the same 3,000 mAh battery.

    The LeEco Le Max 2 has even beefier specs and uses the Snapdragon 820 chipset coupled with 4GB RAM for the 32GB version, and 6GB RAM for the 64GB version. The smartphone features a 5.7-inch QHD display, which is optimized for VR. It has the same 21-megapixel Sony camera as the Le 2 Pro but features OIS. The front camera is still 8 megapixel, and the battery is a slightly larger 3,100 mAh unit. It also uses the Qualcomm SenseID ultrasonic fingerprint sensor.

    Alongside the smartphones, LeEco launched two USB Type-C digital earphones. As all three smartphones have a USB Type-C connector to listen to audio, the company also includes a USB Type-C earphone in the box. All devices also feature Quick Charge technologies.

    The only problem with not having a 3.5mm headphone port is that you cannot charge and listen to music at the same time unless you're using a Bluetooth headset.

    LeEco has priced the Le 2 at 1099 RMB, which is around $170. The Le 2 Pro is priced at 1499 RMB, around $232. Le Max 2 32GB variant with 4GB of RAM will cost you 2099 RMB ($325), whereas the 64GB version with 6GB of RAM will be sold for 2499 RMB or $387.

    The pre-orders for all the devices have already started in China through its Chinese website. The company will also bring one of the models to the United States later this year.


    Source: LeEco Le 2 Announced, First Smartphone Without 3.5mm Headphone Port

    Friday, April 22, 2016

    India to be 2nd largest smartphone mkt by 2017

    New Delhi: India is expected to overtake the US as the second-largest smartphone market next year with robust annual growth, says a Morgan Stanley research report.

    According to the report on global technology and telecom, the country's smartphone market will grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 23% through 2018 and would account for 30% of the global growth during the period.

    "We expect India to overtake the US next year as the second-largest smartphone market by units. India will grow nearly five times faster than the world's largest smartphone market China, where growth has decelerated," the report said.

    It added, "We estimate a 23% CAGR in units in India, compared with 5% over the same period in China. By 2018, we estimate 192 million smartphones will be shipped to India, or 11% of global units."

    Morgan Stanley said there are only 225 million smartphone subscribers in the country, accounting for 18% of the total population. "The improveme nt in demographics, as measured by declining age dependency, has been one of the most important factors supporting higher potential growth in India... We expect consumption to maintain a relatively high growth rate, driven by an increase in per-capita income growth and an emerging middle class," it noted.

    On consumption of data, the report said the country is on the cusp of significant growth in data traffic driven by rising data users as well as growing data usage per user.

    "We expect India's internet penetration to reach 50% by 2018, up from 26% last year, driven by rising smartphone availability and affordability, online content and changing user behaviour," it said.

    The global consultancy estimates 4G smartphones will account for 75% of 170 million shipments by the next year, which currently has less than 1% subscriber penetration in the country. The report, which is based on 2,600 urban smartphone buyers, said the respondents paid an average of Rs 8,50 0 for their smartphones and plan to spend 40% more on their next phone.


    Source: India to be 2nd largest smartphone mkt by 2017

    'India to be 2nd largest smartphone mkt by 2017

    April 23, 2016,New Delhi, PTI

    4G phones will account for 75% of 170 m imports by next year

     India is expected to overtake the US as the second-largest smartphone market next year with robust annual growth, says a Morgan Stanley research report.

    According to the report on global technology and telecom, the country's smartphone market will grow at a compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) of 23% through 2018 and would account for 30% of the global growth during the period.

    "We expect India to overtake the US next year as the second-largest smartphone market by units. India will grow nearly five times faster than the world's largest smartphone market China, where growth has decelerated," the report said.

    It added, "We estimate a 23% CAGR in units in India, compared with 5% over the same period in China. By 2018, we estimate 192 million smartphones will be shipped to India, or 11% of global units."

    Morgan Stanle y said there are only 225 million smartphone subscribers in the country, accounting for 18% of the total population. "The improvement in demographics, as measured by declining age dependency, has been one of the most important factors supporting higher potential growth in India... We expect consumption to maintain a relatively high growth rate, driven by an increase in per-capita income growth and an emerging middle class," it noted.

    On consumption of data, the report said the country is on the cusp of significant growth in data traffic driven by rising data users as well as growing data usage per user.

    "We expect India's internet penetration to reach 50% by 2018, up from 26% last year, driven by rising smartphone availability and affordability, online content and changing user behaviour," it said.

    The global consultancy estimates 4G smartphones will account for 75% of 170 million shipments by the next year, which currently has less than 1% subscriber pen etration in the country. The report, which is based on 2,600 urban smartphone buyers, said the respondents paid an average of Rs 8,500 for their smartphones and plan to spend 40% more on their next phone.

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    Source: 'India to be 2nd largest smartphone mkt by 2017