Foldable smartphone to breach the 3 lakh mark in India next year: Techarc

The foldable smartphone market is expected to breach three lakh units in 2022 and witness a jump of 638% during the current calendar year, a study by Techarc revealed. In terms of revenue, a growth of 60% is expected in 2022 which will translate in Rs 3,200 crore of revenues for the industry. 

In terms of sales volumes, the market is likely to cross 300,000 units in 2022, which will be close to 7% of the ‘luxe’ segment of smartphones.  

While talking to TechCircle exclusively, Faisal Kawoosa, Founder & Chief Analyst, Techarc said, “The foldable smartphones offer unique proposition for users in the luxe segment, and going forward in premium and sub-premium segments, where the users can continue using the smartphones without any compromise on the pocketability (portability) of the smartphones as well as transform it for rich content consumption that includes videos, reading and gaming in some cases.”  

Also read: 5G smartphones drive growth in sector despite chip shortage

Interestingly, Samsung is the only smartphone original equipment maker (OEM) with commercially available foldable smartphones since 2018. Techarc claims that the revenues from foldable smartphone sales for the South Korean smartphone maker are projected to cross Rs 2,000 crore by 2021 end.  This will be close to 5% of Samsung’s total revenues from smartphones in India. Techarc has also maintained that it will include Samsung and a few more OEMs are expected to launch their foldable smartphones in 2022.    

“Samsung undoubtedly has the advantage as it will be with its 4th generation of foldables along with a base which would have experienced foldables by then. Even while some OEMs are expected to launch, Samsung will clearly stand out in foldables (segment),” added Kawoosa. 

The buoyancy in the smartphone sector is foreseen at time when supply constraints and global chip shortages have applied brakes on the Indian smartphone market’s unprecedented post-covid surge. As per International Data Corporation’s (IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker, India's smartphone market registered a year-over-year (YoY) decline of 12% in Q3 of 2021, shipping 48 million units after four consecutive quarters of growth. The report also said that the market should register low single-digit growth as it exits 2021.  

Also read: Semiconductors' paucity puts brakes on accelerated smartphone shipments: IDC