Samsung to launch India-first smartphones to counter Chinese rivals

The three new M-series phones, which Samsung plans to sell only through its website and Amazon.com's Indian operation, will help the company to double online sales.

Samsung plans to launch a budget smartphone series in India ahead of a global release, aiming to regain ground ceded to Chinese rivals such as Xiaomi in the world's second-biggest mobile phone market.

The South Korean company's Indian market share by shipments has lagged Xiaomi's in two of the three 2018 quarters for which data is available, according to technology researcher Counterpoint.

The three new M-series phones, which Samsung plans to sell only through its website and Amazon.com's Indian operation, will help the company to double online sales, the head of Samsung's Indian mobile business told Reuters.

"The M series has been built around and incepted around Indian millennial consumers," Asim Warsi said, adding that the phones will be rolled out globally after the Indian launch at the end of January.

He declined to give specifics but said that online sales account for a double-digit percentage of the company's overall mobile phone revenue.

Samsung's mobile phone sales in India touched Rs 373.5 billion ($5.3 billion) in the 12 months to end-March 2018, according to regulatory filings sourced by paper.vc, a business intelligence platform.

The India-made phones, priced from less than Rs 10,000 ($141.80) up to Rs 20,000, will carry chunkier batteries and features such as quick charging, Warsi said.

Samsung has been sharpening its focus on India, home to more than a billion wireless subscribers and where roughly 350 million users still do not use smartphones.

Last year it opened what it said was the world's biggest mobile phone manufacturing plant on the outskirts of Indian capital New Delhi as well as its biggest mobile phone store globally in Bengaluru.

"A lot of our insights, R&D and developments for consumers in India ... they have great connect with many other consumers in many other parts of the world," Warsi said.

Samsung's Indian business sells its phones through 250,000 retail outlets and more than 2,000 exclusive stores, with support offered by 2,000 service centres.

Business Standard

Man orders mobile phone-worth Rs 9,000 from online site, gets brick instead

The police official said they have registered a case under IPC sections pertaining to cheating and are probing it.

A man here in Maharashtra has filed a complaint against a leading online retailer for allegedly sending him a piece of brick instead of a mobile handset that he ordered, police said Wednesday.

Gajanan Kharat, a resident of HUDCO area here, told the police that on October 9, he placed an order for a mobile phone on the shopping site and also paid Rs 9,134 for it, Harsul police station inspector Manish Kalyankar said.

Kharat subsequently received a message from the e-commerce company that the product would be delivered in a week's time.

The man received a packet from the retailer last Sunday. However, when he opened it, he allegedly found a piece of brick inside it instead of the mobile handset, Kalyankar said.

The man then called up the courier delivery man, who told him that their responsibility was only to deliver the parcel and not to see what was inside it, he said.

Kharat lodged a complaint Tuesday against the e-commerce company at the Harsul police station here.

The police official said they have registered a case under IPC sections pertaining to cheating and are probing it.

Business Standard

23 mn homes in villages still without power, 17% don't have drinking water

The first mobile phone call in India was made in 1995; now, 23 years later, 43,000-odd inhabited villages do not have mobiles services.

Up to 23 million households (in over 292,000 villages) without electricity; 7% (43,000) villages without mobile services; 17% rural habitations without clean drinking water; 25% of 14- to 18-year-olds (nearly 88 million) in rural areas cannot read basic text in own language.

These data reflect those left out of India’s growth story in the country’s rural areas, home to 833 million or 69% of the population, according to various data sets analysed by IndiaSpend.

As India’s economy grew seven-fold over 25 years to Rs 121.9 lakh crore ($1.8 trillion) in 2016-17, moving to the world’s fifth largest over this period, per capita income increased more than four times–from Rs 15,766 to Rs 82,269–during the same period.

Of 640,932 villages in India (597,608 inhabited and 43,324 uninhabited), all inhabited villages have been electrified–according to the government, although this is unverified–but over 23 million households in rural areas are without electricity.

Of more than 219 million rural households, 195 million, or 89%, have been electrified, official data show.

Of 23 million rural households to be electrified, Uttar Pradesh leads the list with over 12 million households, followed by Assam (1.9 million) and Odisha (1.8 million), as on August 22, 2018.

As many as 18,374 Indian villages got electricity over three years to 2018, but in no more than 8%, or 1,425 villages, do all households have electricity, according to the government’s GARV dashboard.

The first mobile phone call in India was made in 1995; now, 23 years later, 43,000-odd inhabited villages do not have mobiles services as on July 27, 2018, according to government data.

Odisha has the most villages (9,940) without mobile services, followed by Maharashtra (6,117) and Madhya Pradesh (5,558).

While mobile phone ownership is increasing, many rural inhabitants still struggle to access electricity for simple daily tasks–such as charging a phone–IndiaSpend reported on May 17, 2018.

Of 1.7 million rural habitations, over 289,000 habitations, or nearly 17%, have only partial access to clean drinking water (getting at least 40 litre per capita per day), according to an August 8, 2018 reply to the Lok Sabha (lower house of Parliament): and 62,582 habitations have water that is “quality affected” or contaminated.

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