tech2 News Staff

Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi has crossed the $1bn revenue mark in India in 2016, which translates to around Rs 7,000 cr. Xiaomi entered the Indian market in June 2014 and within two years has managed to cross the $1bn mark, which is good news for the company which is facing challenges in other markets.

Xiaomi is ranked at no 4 in India with a 7.4 percent market share for Q3 2016, according to an IDC report. Just 0.1 percent behind no 3 Micromax. A major credit for this ranking should undoubtedly go to the success of the Redmi Note 3, which sold a record 2.3mn handsets in India. It also crossed 2 mn smartphone sales within a single quarter (Q3 2016), thereby achieving a year on year growth of around 150 percent.

According to Xiaomi India head Manu Jain, the sales of Xiaomi smartphones doubled after it started selling phones offline.

To keep the momentum going, Jain said that Xiaomi would be scaling up its investments in India to expand manufacturing operations. It will also be expanding its product portfolio this year. Alongside, Jain also plans to direct some of the investments towards startups as well, he mentioned in a report in The Economic Times.

“We are truly excited to announce that Xiaomi has achieved this historic feat of recording over US$1 billion in revenue achieved within two years of us launching our operation in India. It speaks volumes about the love and trust Mi fans have for Xiaomi, and we are extremely thankful to everyone who were a part of our journey. We look forward to an even better 2017,” said Jain.

Jain acknowledged that demonetisation post 8 November 2016 did lead to a slump, but things have picked up since as 90 percent of the sales took online in December.

Xiaomi India plans to take its offline presence up to 30 percent share of sales, up from just 10 percent now. "Single brand retail licence will help us open Mi Home, our brand stores in India, and do more stuff directly than what we do now," said Jain as the company waits for the approval of its single brand retail licence.

Xiaomi India also has plans to expand its monthly smartphone making capacity in its Foxconn unit in India every quarter. Jain said that the company makes around 75 percent of the phones its sells locally, in India. All models, except the high end Xiaomi Mi 5 are made in India. Xiaomi also plans to invest in more hardware and software companies in India such as its investment in Hungama in 2016.

Xiaomi India will also expand its data centre count to 500 in 2017 and add more staff at its Indore and Bengaluru call centres said Jain.

2016 hadn't been the greatest of years for Xiaomi in its home country though. Its Chinese ranking fell to fourth position and there was an overall slump in the China smartphone market as well. Rivals such as Oppo and Vivo raced ahead of Xioami in China in 2016.