Oppo's India sales jump over 750 per cent in FY17

KOLKATA: Oppo Mobiles has surpassed Micromax, the largest homegrown mobile maker, and Sony, the biggest Japanese electronics firm by revenue, after its sales grew more than seven times during FY17. This indicates Chinese dominance in the Indian smartphone market, even though industry executives said Oppo’s growth has actually slowed down this year due to cutting down on investment, impact on sales due to Indo-China frictions, and rival Chinese firm Xiaomi’s rapid growth.

According to the company’s latest regulatory filings, Oppo Mobiles India saw sales surge to Rs 7,974.29 crore in the year ended March 2017, a 754% increase from Rs 933.74 crore in the fiscal before.

That translates into Oppo, that entered India four years ago, adding more than a billion dollars, or about the entire size of Micromax or Sony in just a year. “Oppo was burning a lot of money in the Indian market last fiscal along with Vivo, be it through advertising blitzkrieg, sponsorship of marquee cricketing tournaments, paying retailers hefty margins, buying out retail shelves to place its handsets and branding.

All these led to a massive jump in sales. However, this fiscal its growth rate has plunged,” said a senior industry executive. Another executive said Oppo’s performance in 2016-17 is commendable considering demonetisation in November 2016 took the steam out of smartphone sales when industry sales had declined till the fiscal end. “But this fiscal, Oppo’s growth rate has come down across neighbourhood stores and retail chains. Hence, Oppo which has largely been offline trade focused is now trying to be aggressive online and running promotions and discounts on Amazon and Flipkart,” he said.

An email sent to Oppo India did not elicit any response till press time. Micromax, however, reported a 42% drop in revenue last fiscal to Rs 5,613.97 crore while the second largest homegrown maker Intex’s revenue too plunged 30% to Rs 4,364.08 crore due to Chinese competition and lack of 4G handset portfolio. Sony India’s revenue fell 11% to Rs 7,181.84 crore in 2016-17 due to downsizing of the smartphone business. Xiaomi India had said its revenue for calendar year 2016 was about Rs 7,000 crore, whereby Oppo may have even toppled Xiaomi in the Indian market last fiscal.

Xiaomi recently equalled Samsung in smartphone shipments and the company has said it is targeting doubling sales to $2 billion in India this calendar year. Financials of Vivo and Xiaomi for 2016-17 are not yet posted with the Registrar of Companies.

Oppo had posted a net loss of Rs 206.1 crore in 2015-16, but corresponding figures for last fiscal are yet to be reported. According to Hong Kong-based researcher Counterpoint, Chinese firms controlled more than half the Indian smartphone market as of September this year, compared with 33% a year earlier. The share of Indian brands has narrowed to 14% from 33% in the same period.

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