Voto Mobiles to enter Indian market, to launch 3 new smartphones in sub-Rs 10,000 category

A new China-based smartphone company is set to enter the Indian market. The company is planning to launch three new smartphones in the sub-₹10,000 category.

The company aims to sell about 1.5 lakh units in the first month and has planned an aggressive marketing campaign to position its brand in the hyper-competitive segment. "We have about 400 distributors onboard pan-India and our devices will be available in the market from August 18. India is the first international market for us and we are targeting sale of 1.5 lakh devices in the first month," Voto Mobiles Business Head -- Overseas, Sayantan Dey told PTI.

He added that the company will also launch an aggressive marketing campaign across television and radio stations to enhance brand visibility. The handset market in India has recently seen new Chinese brands like Transsion's Techno and Infinix, Comio and iVoomi enter the Indian market.

There are already a number of smartphone brands present in the country. Interestingly, there were four Chinese players among the top 5 with Xiaomi, Vivo, Lenovo and Oppo. Cumulatively, these accounted for over 43 per cent of the March quarter's smartphone shipments, as per data from research firm IDC.

Overall, China-based vendors contributed more than half to the overall shipment of 27 million units in the January-March 2017 quarter. "There are a lot of players in the Indian market. Our focus is on ensuring great user experience at affordable prices. We will play in the ₹6,000-10,000 price bracket, which is growing at a strong pace," Dey said.

The company has also put in place a network of over 600 after-sales service centres, while creating a network of over 2,000 in-shop demonstrators, he added. Dey said the company has earmarked about ₹35-40 crore in marketing and promotion budget for the initial phase and will pump in more if required.

Voto also plans to expand to neighbouring markets like Nepal and Bangladesh in the next quarter and CIS countries by next year, Dey said. It currently sells its handsets in China under an exclusive partnership with China Mobile.