Backed by former Apple CEO John Sculley, Obi Worldphone (formerly called Obi Mobiles) has launched two smartphones priced between $129-249. This is the company’s second attempt to gain a foothold in the Indian market after a failed attempt last year.
The company had launched its phones early last year in India, but it withdrew all its stock from the Indian market. Neeraj Chauhan, CEO, Obi Worldphone said that it wanted to try out distributing commodity phones from China. “It didn’t work in India, although it was successful in the UAE,” he said, adding Obi has a 5.7% market share in the UAE.
“It didn’t work in India because in India we were one of the many people trying to sell that same thing with no apparent differentiation. Then we realised and took a step back and stopped selling those phones in India,” Chauhan said adding that it was then they engaged with Ammunition and saw things take shape.
The business model, Sculley explained would be low-margin and driven by volume and backed by its design-oriented approach.
“Our design elegance will become our core marketing message and secondly that the extra investment we make into this thing will help us get the numbers.” he said.
Travel for this report was sponsored by ObiPhone
