Chinese handset maker Huawei Technologies, which sells phones in India through two brands — Huawei, available at brick-and-mortar stores and Honor, exclusively online — plans standalone stores in India’s top cities by the end of the current fiscal. Wang Guodong (Allen), president, consumer business group, Huawei and Honor India, tells Rhik Kundu & Pranav Nambiar that the company will customise its offerings for the young, who are its biggest users. Excerpts:

Why are you planning standalone stores when the online market is growing faster?

That will help us showcase our brands. A lot of people, especially in India and China, still want to see and feel products before buying them.

Brick-and-mortar stores complain that online handset sales, usually a lot cheaper, are denting their margins. What’s your take on this?

Both India and China face this problem. In China, 30% handsets are sold online. This number is increasing for India as well. I admit there’s competition between offline channels and e-tailers to lure consumers. While online players are able to offer a lower price, brick-and-mortar stores still sell more handsets. Huawei products/handsets are sold more through offline shops than online channels. Honor, however, is sold exclusively online.

How do you plan to increase your market share in India?

We have a lot of interesting features on our products running on Android OS. Our strategy for India is simple. We will continue releasing our offerings under two brands. We deliver 75 million phones in a year globally, and over 50% of this comes from overseas markets (ex China).

We are the biggest smartphone manufacturer globally after Apple and Samsung. The Honor brand, whose sales started in the fourth quarter of FY14, has grown over 10 times in the last one year (in terms of volumes). And India has contributed significantly to this growth story.

How strategic is the India R&D team to your global operations?

We employ about 3,000 people at our R&D centre in Bangalore. The team there doesn’t only work on products earmarked for the Indian market, but also for other global markets. The strength of our Indian R&D centre is its IT infrastructure and the engineers’software capabilities. A lot of IT and engineering work on our products come from the India centre.

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