With 47% market share, Reliance Jio Phone tops feature phone category: Report

In less than a year of its launch, Reliance Jio Phone has emerged as the market leader in the feature phone category, with a 47 per cent market share, according to statistics by Counterpoint Research.

Reliance Jio Phone was able to reach the mark by the second quarter of this year, according to the report. By this quarter, Samsung—which was leading at 27 per cent last year— left with a paltry 9 per cent market share.

Nokia is the third largest player in the feature phone segment with 8 per cent share. The Finnish company has witnessed more than 2x growth since last year when its market share stood at just 3 per cent.

Itel in India stands at number four with 6 per cent market share. It has a market share of 16 percent in 2017, which has fallen tremendously this year.

Since the launch of its feature phone, Reliance Jio has witnessed an exceptional growth in this category. Jio feature phone in the December quarter had captured 27 per cent share of the market, according to Counterpoint Research.

Amidst this, the feature phone segment has seen an extraordinary growth in India. In 2017, about 164 million feature phones sold out. According to market research firm International Data Corporation (IDC), the feature phone sales grew by 17 per cent in 2017 over the previous year.

The growth signifies that telecom users in smaller cities and rural areas still prefer functional benefits of feature phones such as low cost, durability and battery life amongst others.

Currently, over 90 brands including Indian makers — Lava, Intex Micromax and Karbonn — sell feature phones. A joint survey by  Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) and Kantar IMRB revealed that majority of feature phone users are from upper SECs (socio-economic classification) and middle-class section.

The development was first reported by Firstpost.