Chinese brand Realme cracks tough Indian market

Last year, when a global chip shortage forced many smartphone makers to delay launches, upstart Chinese brand Realme took a gambit in India.

With processors from global giants such as Qualcomm Inc in short supply, Realme decided to buy them from a relatively unknown Shanghai manufacturer to be able to keep churning out new handset models.

The move paid off, boosting the fouryear-old newcomer’s sales and helping it reach the No. 3 position in the fastgrowing market with about 600 million smartphone users. Only Samsung Electronics Co and Xiaomi Corp sold more devices in India in the latest quarter, with Realme closing in.

Closely held Realme has emerged as a force in the lucrative but treacherous Indian market where even global brands like Apple Inc have struggled with regulatory hurdles.

And in recent months, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s administration has heightened the scrutiny of Chinese companies as the two nuclear-armed nations clash politically.

Yet Realme has so far escaped the government crackdown unscathed. All smartphones it sells in India are built in the country, boosting local employment.

And Realme is helping India bring new users online with its Android smartphones that can cost less than $100, a fraction of what iPhones and pricier Samsung models go for.

“What I want to do is to bring more affordability to the India market,” Realme’s India boss Madhav Sheth said in an interview at a coffee shop next to the company’s local headquarters on the outskirts of New Delhi.

“Realme is in compliance with all Indian legal requirements and believes in cooperation with authorities,’’ he said.

Realme’s relatively smooth sailing is in stark contrast with the obstacles its larger rivals have faced.

Apple had to wrestle with the government for years just to open retail stores in the country and also had a protracted faceoff with authorities around a statebuilt spam-detection app that accesses users’ call logs.

This year, the government cracked down on market leader Xiaomi with an anti-money-laundering agency moving to confiscate more than $700 million from the Chinese company.

Realme has taken advantage of rivals’ challenges by expanding its distribution to more than 40,000 stores and introducing aggressively priced devices such as last year’s 13,999 rupee ($180) Realme 8 5G, the cheapest fifth-generation wireless device at the time.

“Such tactics have helped it eat into Xiaomi and Samsung’s market share in India,’’ said Tarun Pathak of tech researcher Counterpoint.

Realme commanded 16% of India’s smartphone market by shipment volumes in the first quarter of this year, up from 11% a year earlier. It only lags behind Samsung’s 20% and Xiaomi’s 23%, and was the only player to grow in double digits last year while rivals shrank, according to Counterpoint.

“Realme has held back the growth of Xiaomi and Samsung,” Pathak said.

Samsung and Xiaomi representatives didn’t respond to requests for comment.

Encouraged by its gains, Realme unveiled its first global flagship store in Modi’s home state of Gujarat this month.

The 13,000-square-foot (1,200-squaremetre) space in the city of Ahmedabad is part of Realme’s plan to become more of a premium player in India.

The Chinese company also envisages India as a step toward global expansion.