Mobile handsets maker Lava International is riding on its Xolo range of devices to get a larger share of the premium smartphone market.

The company is targeting sales of nearly ₹3,000 crore from Xolo devices by the end of 2014-15 compared with ₹1,000 crore now. This is expected to more than double the overall revenue of Lava International to nearly ₹7,000 crore from ₹3,000 crore.

While the Lava brand will continue to play in the sub-₹15,000 Android category, the company has plans to launch Xolo devices on the Windows operating system to offer more options in the high-end segment.

This comes even as multinational device makers such as Nokia has launched Android phones to eat into the low–end segment of the phone market currently dominated by local brands such as Lava.

Second brand

“For the entry level market, we continue to address with the Lava brand, but for the leading market and the premium-end market, we felt that it is a better marketing strategy to go with a second brand — Xolo,” Vishal Sehgal, Co-founder and Director, Lava International, told Business Line .

The company is investing ₹100 crore in the next few months for marketing Xolo brand. It also plans to expand the distribution network for Xolo devices from 100 towns currently to 1,000 towns in next three months.

“We are anticipating a huge growth in the smartphone market from 2.5 million smartphones a month now to 6 million,” Sehgal said. Lava International took a decision two years ago to address the smartphone market with two brands — Lava and Xolo. While Lava will have products up to around ₹15,000 phones, Xolo will play in the ₹5,000-25,000 smartphone market.

According to analysts, local brands such as Lava have done well in the fourth quarter last year and they would continue to grow.

“The growth in the smartphone market is being propelled by the launch of low-end, cost-competitive devices by international and local vendors which are further narrowing the price gaps that exist between feature phones and smartphones,” Manasi Yadav, Senior Market Analyst at IDC India, said.

Growing imports

According to IDC’s latest quarterly report, vendors imported a total of 15.06 million smartphones in the fourth quarter (ended December) compared with 5.35 million units in the same period of 2012.

Lava managed to hold on to the No. 5 spot in the smartphone vendor list (after Samsung, Micromax, Karbonn and Sony) with a market share of 4.7 per cent during the period.

Related Topics
comment COMMENT NOW