25 Percent of Smartphones Sales Will Be Online in 2 Years: Micromax

With growing consumer preference to shop online, domestic handset maker Micromax expects 25 percent of its smartphones sales to come from e-commerce platforms over the next two years.

The company, which has partnered e-commerce major Snapdeal for launching its latest handset - Canvas Nitro, currently gets about 10 percent of its sales from online purchases.

"Online is small but is definitely growing. About 10 percent of our sales are coming from that. Over the next two years, 25 percent of at least the smartphone sales would come from online," Micromax Chief Executive Officer Vineet Taneja said.

He added that the company would continue with its mix of online and offline sales.

The company on Monday launched a new octa-core smartphone, priced at Rs. 12,990, the Canvas Nitro.

Canvas Nitro, to be available exclusively on e-commerce major Snapdeal, is powered by a 1.7 GHz octa-core processor and Android 4.4.2 KitKat.

"We are excited to be partnering with Micromax to launch their latest product - the Canvas Nitro. The new product has most superior technology and we are sure that this will be well-received by our 25 million members," Snapdeal Senior Vice President - Electronics & Home Tony Navin said.

At Snapdeal, mobile and tablets are one of the fastest growing categories and this partnership is a strategic decision to add to the online marketplace's offerings, he added.

Micromax, which was recently reported to be the country's second largest handset maker, also plans to bring in two more smartphones apart from feature phones ahead of the festive season.

"Apart from the Android One phone, we will have one more smartphone and some feature phones, as there is still a market for them. By early next year, we should have a 4G handset as well," he said.

Currently, 60 percent of Micromax's sales volumes comes from feature phones, while the remaining is from smartphones.

As a large chunk of Indian users are migrating to affordable smarter devices from feature phones, Indian smartphone market grew 84 percent year-on-year to 18.42 million units from 10.02 million units (in April-June 2013 quarter), according to research firm IDC.

Korean handset maker Samsung still continues to lead the smartphone market with 29 percent share, followed by Micromax 18 percent, Karbonn 8 percent and Lava 6 percent.