Africa’s leading mobile manufacturer of high-end smartphones and feature phones – TECNO, has announced its expansion into the Middle East. Celebrating its tenth anniversary year, the move into the region comes after successfully establishing itself as one of the biggest phone brands in Africa.
Over the past decade, the mobile phone penetration rate in Africa has risen to 80% from 6%, with TECNO Mobile products shipped to over 30 African countries. Currently, the Chinese mobile multinational enjoys its largest market share of 41.1% and 31.1% in Tanzania and Nigeria respectively. Also, recent market survey places TECNO Mobile as Africa’s No 1 smartphone brand, controlling an average 25.3% market share of the entire African market – the highest for any mobile phone manufacturer.
“We believe that emerging markets are where the future growth is for smartphones,” said Vane Ni, Global Marketing lead, TECNO Mobile.
“We are excited to be making our Middle Eastern debut with the launch of our latest Phantom flagships, the TECNO Phantom 6 and 6 plus. The Middle East will be an important market for us as part of our growth strategy. We believe it is the perfect landscape to be taking our next step” Vane added.
IDC 2015 report on Africa puts sales of smartphones on the increase, by 108% which surprisingly represents only one third of the total mobile phone sales volume in the African market. While the worldwide smartphone market growth is showing a noticeable slowdown, emerging markets are just taking off.
International Data Corporation (IDC)* report also showed decline in mobile phone shipments to the Middle East in 2016 which it attributed to a lack of smartphone innovation and a variety of socioeconomic factors. Phones priced less than $300 now make up 52% of the GCC's smartphone market, with consumers looking for an attractive value proposition, IDC stated.
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