Nokia Corporation, the world’s
biggest maker of mobile phones, has
said India is its second largest
market, after China, in terms of
handset sales.
India overtook markets such as the
United Kingdom and the United States
in the quarter ended June 2007, based
on sales of handsets and network
business.
Over the past three years, India has
been gaining significant ground,
moving from the No. 4 position in 2005
to the No. 3 position in 2006, and is
today placed at No 2.
Nokia says it had predicted India
would overtake the United States as
its second biggest sales market by
2010.
According to Nokia officials, India
has around 185 million mobile phone
users, of which nearly 85 million are
Nokia users.
In another development, Nokia said its
manufacturing plant at Sriperumbudur
near Chennai, Tamil Nadu, produced
nearly 60 million handsets in the last
18 months. Around half of these are
being exported to 58 countries spread
across the Middle East, Africa, Asia,
Australia, and New Zealand.
Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, Nokia’s chief
executive, who was on a visit to India
recently, said: “In 2004, Nokia
employed 450 people in India, but
today we have over 9,000 in India.
Total outlets in India currently
stands at 95,000, out of which 50,000
are selling exclusive Nokia-brand
phones. We will continue to grow in
India at a much faster pace.”
Nokia Siemens Networks plans to invest
$100 million in India over the next
three years, some of which will go
towards setting up another
manufacturing facility in Tamil Nadu,
among other things.
Nokia is also the world’s largest
maker of camera and music devices.
Now, it wants to be a major internet
service company as well.
Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo was quoted by
CNBC-TV18 as saying: “The thinking is
increasingly to generate service type
of revenue, on top of the platform. We
are doing that already at the moment.
We are selling navigation services to
consumers in different markets. So,
when the consumer buys a Nokia phone,
he/she will get maps free in the
phone. We are also selling navigation
services in the phone and getting
service revenue there, as opposed to
the hardware sale or device sale. That
is an important opening and I see a
lot of opportunity in that area.”
Mobile phones fetch Nokia US $55
billion every year. With a 36% market
share, Nokia sells as many phones as
Motorola, Samsung, and Sony Erickson
together.
