CY 2012 Highlights
- Nokia, Samsung and Micromax emerged market leaders
- 22 vendors shipped mobile phones in Sri Lanka in CY 2012 through established trade channels
- ‘Grey’ handsets market estimated to be 18% over and above total reported shipments
Q4 2012 Highlights
- Nokia emerged as a market leader followed by Samsung and Micromax
- Smartphones contributed 9.7% of total shipments in 4Q 2012 with Android shipments accounting for over 90%
- Multi-SIM featurephones and entry level smartphones witnessed increase in shipments
Colombo / Gurgaon: The Sri Lanka mobile phones market recorded sales of over 0.57 million units in Q4 (October-December) 2012. This was reported in the Sri Lanka Mobile Handsets Market Review 4Q 2012, April 2013 release published today by premier IT, Telecoms and Semiconductor & Electronics, market intelligence and advisory firm CyberMedia Research.
In the overall Sri Lanka mobile handsets market, Nokia emerged as the leader with a 31.9% share, followed by Samsung at second position with 17.4% and Micromax at third position with 10.4%, in terms of sales (unit shipments) during 4Q 2012.
Commenting on the results, Faisal Kawoosa, Lead Analyst, CMR Telecoms Practice said, “With the level of volumes that the Sri Lanka mobile handsets market is doing, it is a natural extension of business opportunity for Indian players. While Micromax is already present in Sri Lanka, it is the right time for other Indian vendors to strengthen their operations in the country and establish their presence.”
“There are many common areas of social, cultural and economic similarity between India and Sri Lanka, making Indian handset brands highly viable for Sri Lanka consumers,” Faisal added.
Smartphones
Smartphone sales (shipments) touched 0.05 million units in Sri Lanka during 4Q 2012. Samsung emerged as the leader in the smartphone segment with a 47.07% share in 4Q 2012, followed by Sony Mobile with 12.50%. Huawei occupied third place with 10.71% share of shipments during the same period.
“Though 3G connectivity has been limited in the island nation, it is expected to pick up once operators expand their infrastructure to newer areas and optimize the existing coverage. This will result in a rise for demand of 3G-enabled smartphones amongst Sri Lanka consumers,” stated Tarun Pathak, Analyst, CMR Telecoms Practice.
“A lot of excitement can be seen in the local mobile application developer community, who are creating indigenous apps for smartphones with the active support of operators. Such positive ecosystem developments will further drive the penetration of smartphones in the Sri Lanka market”, concluded Tarun.
Notes for Editors
- CyberMedia Research (CMR) uses the term “shipments” to describe the number of handsets leaving the factory premises for OEM sales or stocking by distributors and retailers. For the convenience of media, the term shipments has been replaced by or interchangeably used with ‘sales’ in the press release, but this reflects the market size in terms of units of mobile handsets and not their absolute value. In the case of handsets imported into the country, it represents the number leaving the first warehouse to OEMs, distributors and retailers. CyberMedia Research does not track the number of handsets brought on their person by individual passengers landing in Sri Lanka from overseas destinations or ‘grey’ market handsets. These are, therefore, not part of the CyberMedia Research numbers reported here.
