Chinese Preference
Smartphone users in China are opting for more expensive handsets than before these days. In response, smartphone manufacturers are increasing their supply of high-performance phones.
According to the Institute for Information & Communications Technology Promotion, the average selling price in the Chinese smartphone market rose from US$207 to US$257 between 2013 and last year. Under the circumstances, ZTE recently released the AXON Tianji 7 with a minimum price of 3,299 yuan. This product targeting mid- to high-end market customers was designed by a team of designers from BMW and pianist Lang Lang has been selected as its spokesmodel. In addition, each AXON Tianji 7 comes with a unique tree ring.
The Oppo R9 has a maximum price of 2,799 yuan. Its sales volume reached no less than 180,000 units on its first day in the market and rose to 400,000 units or so until its fourth. This product comes with the MediaTek Helio p10 processor, a 4 GB RAM, 64 GB internal storage, a micro SD card slot and a 13-megapixel rear camera.
In the meantime, Samsung Electronics is trying to recover its share in the Chinese market with the Galaxy C5 and the Galaxy C7 with starting prices of 2,199 yuan and 2,599 yuan, respectively. Both provide the Samsung Pay mobile payment service.
“Nowadays, Chinese manufacturers such as Xiaomi and Meizu are still alive and kicking in the low-cost smartphone market segment in China with the number of rivals in the segment on the rise while the competition in the high-end segment is still ongoing among Apple, Samsung Electronics and Huawei,” said an industry source, adding, “It seems that manufacturers are concentrating on the niche market between the two in order to avoid competition.”