India Rated Among Fastest Growing Smartphone Markets in Asia-Pacific By IDC

Remember all those times when we used to mention in our pieces how the Indian market is one of the most exciting places to be in recent times? Well, it seems like the domestic market is indeed rated highly with the market also being among the fastest growing smartphone markets in Asia-Pacific.

According to IDC's latest report on the subject, India became the highest growing market in Asia Pacific with a year-on-year smartphone shipment that showed growth of over 186% in 1Q 2014.

Apparently, the vast majority of the country's user base shifted to smartphones from feature phones, the result of which was shown when the Indian smartphone market outshone other emerging markets like China. For the record, China registered a year-on-year growth of 31% in 1Q 2014.

"This rapid pace of growth in smartphones is expected to continue in India. While we notice that much of the growth is coming from low-cost devices using the Android operating system, Windows is making adequate gains too based on the strength of the entry level product mix in smartphones," said Kiran Kumar, Research Manager- Client Devices at IDC India.

As far as raw numbers are concerned, according to IDC Asia Pacific Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker (which excludes Japan), "vendors shipped a total of 17.59 million smartphones in 1Q 2014 compared to 6.14 million units in the same period of 2013."

"The shipment contribution of "phablets" (which IDC defines as 5.5 inch-6.99 inch screen size smartphones) in 1Q 2014 was noted to be around 5% of the overall market," ThinkDigit notes.

"The category grew by 125% in 1Q 2014 in terms of sheer volume over 4Q 2013. The primary reason behind this trend is the launch of low-end phablets by international and local vendors alike."

Moreover, IDC also expects the migration from feature phones to smartphones to increase with cheaper variants of smartphones gearing up to launch in the market.