With foldable smartphones becoming the next aspirational product after iPhones, Chinese smartphone brand Tecno is looking to tap tier-2 and 3, and beyond cities for its foldable smartphones, and not just restricting itself to high-income consumers in the metros.
The company believes that availability of its foldable smartphone at price points of around `88,000 compared to over `1,50,000 by the competition, as well as better specifications, automatically make its premium product more attractive to the consumers even in smaller cities.
“We have launched the Fold phone at a price lower than Flip. We are fulfilling the aspirations of the people, which is very important,” said Arijeet Talapatra, chief executive officer of Transsion Holdings India, parent company of brands like Tecno, Infinix and Itel.
In the foldable segment, Tecno launched its first product – PHANTOM V Fold – at the Mobile World Congress in February 2023. The company is soon expected to launch a Flip phone.
When asked about why a consumer would choose Tecno over Samsung, Talapatra said, “With affordable schemes people can buy a Samsung, but why would a person give `80,000 more premium, when he or she can close it at `80,000 with less number of installments.”
“Having said that, we don’t fight with anybody on cost, we fight with them on specs. So consumers would not buy us because we are affordable but we offer good experience and features. In our foldable phone, we offer a good battery, rear camera, front camera, chipset, and display, which is better than competition,” Talapatra added.
According to market analyst firm Techarc, foldable smartphone revenue will cross `6,300 crore in India by 2023-end. In 2023, the foldable smartphones are expected to contribute over 1.8% to the total smartphone revenues and the same will be achieved by selling over 635,000 such smartphones during the year, Techarc said.
Apart from Tecno, foldable smartphones such as Motorola Razr 40 Ultra, Motorola Razr 40, Oppo Find N2 Flip, Tecno Phantom V Fold, Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 4 and Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 are among the current options available in the market.
Besides fold phones, Tecno is banking on the premiumisation trend to grow its shipments in the Indian market. The premium smartphone segment, which is above `30,000, contributes about 15% to the overall revenues of Tecno.
According to IDC, Tecno was amongst the top nine smartphone brands in the country with a market share of 3.8%. Its sister company Infinix, which sells smartphones in the range of `6,000-30,000, also has a 3.5% market share as of June-end.
In the April-June quarter, the company witnessed a 112% growth in shipments in the premium and ultra-premium segments backed by new launches in the first half of the year.
“In the above `30,000 segment, the market is around 17%, but that market is going very fast. Techno has already proved its mettle in the less than `20,000 segment but now our focus will be in the premium and ultra premium segments,” Talapatra said.
In the premium segment, Tecno counts products such as Phantom X2 Pro, Camon 20 Pro, etc, as its smartphones. The company, however, said it will continue to focus on the below `20,000 market, which accounts for 70% of the overall industry consumer base.
“We are still focusing on the `15,000-20,000 segment. It is not that we want to leave that segment because even consumers from 4G will move to affordable 5G. So we have to get involved in, and we also need to participate in the affordable 5G segment,” Talapatra said.
In 2023, Tecno has so far launched 17 smartphone models across segments, and plans to launch 13 more.
