Phablets Are Becoming More Popular, Likely To Claim The Tablet Market In India

Technological changes have been much more rapid in the past 10 years, as compared to the last 5o years. The result is that existing technology is displaced by a new technology and the market forces shift in the favor of it. We saw it when the laptop displaced the PC in terms of sales in late nineties and early 2000s.

We also came across that phenomenon when tablets ate away the PC business and pushed PC makers on the verge of looking out for other businesses like online TV and content streaming. Smartphone internet services hampered the conventional TV business (they still are), and now the phablet (which is essentially a large screen smartphone) is poised to eat away the tablet market share.

Over the next 12-18 months, larger smartphones will start encroaching on the tablet market share, contributing to a slower market growth for tablets, said IDC program Vice President Bob O’ Donnell. IDC also stated that it expects the tablet shipments will surpass total PC shipments (desktop plus portable PCs) by the fourth quarter of 2013.

While Samsung is the one popularizing the phablet format, many players adopted the idea to rise to fame. Micromax for example utilized the “large screen” propaganda and rose to fame with a sudden upsurge in the Indian market smartphone sales. The right mix of marketing and pricing strategy has placed Micromax second only to Samsung, pricing strategy playing the major role here. Smaller manufacturers like i-ball and Intex tried to follow suit but were crushed by the competition. There are even rumors of Apple considering the phablet market as Samsung’s market share of global smartphone sales rose from 30 to 32 percent in the second quarter of 2013 while Apple’s share fell from 19 to 14 per cent over the same period. Apple might consider screen sizes of up to 6 inches.

Phablets first started as a trend driven by mature markets such as South Korea, Hong Kong and Singapore. But it is now gaining popularity even in emerging markets such as China and India. Samsung’s Note, Note 2 and Note 3 have been a rage with youngsters and adults because of several reasons; they can handle business applications and everyday communications, both like a charm.

The 6.3 inch Galaxy mega is the best example of Samsung considering the Indian subcontinent, the phablet oriented market. Lenovo, HTC and Sony Xperia, all have come out with screen sizes more than 5.5 inches. Neil Mawston of Strategy Analytics and Joshua Flood of ABI Research, among other bigwigs of the smartphone analytics industry have termed 2013 as the year of phablet.

The technology supporting a desktop architecture is unveiled by Apple with iphone 5S. This will further pave way for future computer like handheld devices and would hamper the growth of PCs. Companies battle it out for the top position with newer growth strategies, pricing schemes (Apple released a cheap end smartphone, the Apple iPhone 5C), marketing strategies (HTC’s ‘butterfly model’) and technological developments (Huawei’s P6, the slimmest smartphone) but the phablets are on the rise and these companies don’t deny it.

Budget tablets and phablets are popular in India and are in demand with companies like Micromax and Karbonn scoring big with their ‘under 20k’ price strategy.  Nokia on the other hand, after struggling in its once stronghold Indian phone market, also looks to take advantage of the situation with its new phablet release. Whoever be the player, phablets will be the overall winner this year, as far as the projections go.

Image Courtesy |  esquire

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