Oppo and Amazon have partnered to launch a new sub-brand of smartphones as a direct competition to the Asus-Flipkart partnership. The company plans on announcing their new smartphone brand today ie on May 1st.
The Chinese smartphone maker has posted an impressive sales result in the Q1 of 2018, and stood at 4th place in the India Smartphone Market Share, according to a report by Counterpoint. Oppo plans on competing with the Taiwanese company with this new partnership. The new smartphone is said to be tailored to meet people’s needs.
Amazon is running a banner on its website that has a caption which reads “A new partnership for the real me”. The yet to announced smartphone will be disruptive and is said to feature great technology and great design alongside the promise of a great service, as the listing claims.
The new brand has conducted a survey to get an insight into the youths’ smartphone preferences. In the six months duration of the survey, the company came to a conclusion that youth preferred smartphones with a differentiated design with a solid build quality and great performance, which didn’t break their banks.
The company has also announced their first smartphone, the Realme 1 that will be launching exclusively on Amazon on May 15th. The image reveals the Black Diamond variant of the smartphone with a triangular cut design pattern on the back that shimmers in bright and dark shades when the angle is shifted. This is the same design that we saw on the Oppo F7 a while ago.
Speaking on the launch of the brand, Madhav Seth, Chief Executive Officer, Realme India, said, “Today, young consumers prefer a better phone design that represents their different but real personalities. They are looking for an affordable price option without compromising on the built-quality and the device performance. On the functional side, their ask is a smarter camera and selfie experience. Realme phones will satisfy the needs of the young and online consumers through its exquisite design, leading specs, cutting edge technology and industry-leading quality. We believe we will be the real disruptor in online smartphone market!”
Talking about its partnership with Realme, Noor Patel, Director – Category Management, Amazon India said “Smartphones continue to be one of our largest categories, making us the destination of choice for customers as well as brands. We are excited to partner with OPPO for the launch of their new sub-brand that appeals to savvy, young shoppers. Their new smartphone, the Realme 1, will be available from May 15 exclusively on Amazon.in. With a focus on providing the best selection at the best prices and the convenience of fast & reliable delivery, we have and will continue to work customer backwards.”
If the company intends to introduce a disruptive smartphone at an affordable price, it needs to compete with the likes of Xiaomi’s Redmi Note series and the recently launched ZenFone Max Pro M1 from Asus. The ever so popular Xiaomi Redmi Note 5 Pro might be in trouble if Oppo prices the new smartphone in the 10k-15k price segment, whose price was recently upped due to the changes in the taxation of the PCBA imports.
Additionally, Oppo has recently started assembling new Printed Circuit Boards (PCBs) at its second plant, in India. A part of the second plant will be utilized to manufacture phones for the new sub-brand, which has a total production capacity of 50 million units.
Realme customers will have access to over 500 OPPO service centers across India with guaranteed 90% of repair cases resolved within an hour.
The BBK electronics creating competition among it’s own brands to capture larger market share but didn’t it amount to cartelisation, thanks