Xiaomi, China’s leading smartphone maker, plans to ramp up sales in India through its own ecommerce site, although it has no immediate plans to trim offerings with retail partners Flipkart, Amazon and Snapdeal, a top company executive told ET. “Xiaomi is keen to sell more products in India through Mi.com and grow its ecommerce business,” Manu Jain, India operations head, told ET.
He said the company would “scale up Mi.com without artificially constraining sales through partner sites like Flipkart, Amazon and Snapdeal.”
Xiaomi’s ecommerce ambitions in India come amid the growing popularity of its Mi Store app, which has been downloaded over 1 million times in barely two months. Launched on Google Play in July, the Mi Store app allows folks to browse and buy Xiaomi devices on the go.
“We are much more than just a smartphone company as we also provide Internet services and sell our products through ecommerce and can contribute to India’s growth as a technological hub since the country’s mobile ecosystem is growing very rapidly,” said Jain. He did not respond to ET’s query on how Xiaomi would prevent a progressive reduction in the volume of sales through partner websites while boosting offerings on Mi.com.
Over 90% of Xiaomi’s products in India are sold online, primarily through partner sites. In China, roughly 70% of its sales are online and a majority of this is through its own site, Mi.com.
Would Xiaomi consumers in India be more comfortable buying online through Mi.com instead of partner sites? “We will certainly examine this but we do not have the data to comment on the consumer comfort or trust factor at this stage,” Jain told ET.
He did not respond to a query on whether “consumer trust or comfort factor” could eventually drive Mi.com’s ecommerce operations in India. Xiaomi’s decision to ramp up sales through its own website is also in step with plans to locally manufacture the bulk of devices to be sold in India in the next two years.
Last month, the Chinese company unveiled its first India-made smartphone, Redmi 2 Prime, and announced a partnership with Foxconn Technology Group of Taiwan, the world’s leading contract manufacturer, to make smartphones in the country.
Apart from smartphones, Xiaomi sells accessories such as Mi Bands to monitor fitness, power banks and headphones in India.
input through ET