Micromax leads Indian tablet market: Research report

A CyberMedia Research report reveals that the number of tablet shipments has increased in the country in the second quarter of this year. The increase was 59 percent QoQ (quarter-on-quarter), and a mind-boggling 673 percent YoY (year-on-year). The research report attributes it primarily to the entry of new tablet vendors and the introduction of newer products from existing vendors in the low to medium price segment.

Among its major findings, the report revealed that Micromax has come out on top, followed by the likes of Samsung Electronics and Apple Inc. The report elaborates that in the Indian tablet market, Micromax enjoys the lead with an 18.4 percent share, followed by Samsung at second position with 13.3 percent, Apple at third position with 12.3 percent, in terms of sales (unit shipments) during the Q2 of 2012.

Android has emerged as the leading choice for OS (Image credit: Getty Images)

Putting numbers into perspective, the report found that the total tablet market in India registered a sales of 0.55 million units Q2 2012.

Importantly, the report found that although the Indian tablet market is at a nascent stage, it has become competitive, riding on the entry of new vendors with entry-level offerings. Interestingly, roughly 90 vendors launched their tablets till Q2 2012. “The ASV of the tablets in 2Q 2012 has dropped to little above INR 13,000 from INR 26,000 in 1Q 2012, as a majority of vendors in early 2012 launched their products in the INR 5,000-10,000 price range,” the report added.

According to Faisal Kawoosa, Lead Analyst, CMR Telecoms Practice, “During 2Q 2012, 47.4% of tablet sales were from new entrants in the market with a strong focus on addressing application areas in the Education and Entertainment segments. The import of this stance clearly demonstrates that vendors are aiming to position their devices at India’s youth population.”

The report highlighted some key trends in terms of specifications of media tablets in India, as noted in Q2 of 2012. Connectivity-wise, Wi-Fi emerged as the trending option with 69.6 percent share. The 7-inch display category trended in the Q2 of 2012 with 79.7 percent share. Android, as it turns out emerged as the trending option for OS with a whopping 87.5 percent share.

“As Android devices become increasingly popular with users across the world, competition is increasing in the India Tablets market with more and more vendors launching devices based on the Android OS. The share of devices based on other operating systems like Windows, iOS and QNX are expected to rise in future in view of the recent announcement of the Microsoft Windows Surface Tablet, the global launch of the Apple iPad 3 and reduction in BlackBerry Playbook prices”, Faisal further added.

“Going forward we see vendors launching devices for particular industry segments other than Education, such as Healthcare, Retail and e-Governance. In terms of tablet use cases, the popular categories are Internet browsing, Email, Entertainment, Gaming, Social Networking, Information (Cricket, Flights etc). Clearly, the Indian user is also taking to the Tablet as a content consumption device”, added Tarun Pathak, Analyst, CMR Telecoms Practice.

To read the entire report, click here.