What is your take on flash sales? Do you believe in that and want to plan something similar?
Some brands say ‘our products sold out in 2 seconds or 5 seconds.’ We believe in nothing of that sort; we believe that when we are launching a device, we should be able to satisfy our consumers’ desires. That is what happened with us. After we launched Micromax Unite, we sold over one million phones in about 100 days. If we calculate, we sold one phone every 4 seconds. Such rapid sales rate happens when you get the innovation right; when you deliver value to the consumers. Not just the price but the product consumers want is the most important thing. We are very proud of Micromax Unite which gave us lot of business in the last 3 to 4 months.
Tell us more about Divide No More campaign?
This is the philosophy of Democratization of Technology, which means the latest technology is not only for a privileged few but for masses. So we are focused on introducing products and models that assure that the latest technology can be accessed by majority of the population.
What are your plans for Micromax globally?
We are present in Bangladesh, Nepal and we also launched our products in Russia, so our devices business is globally at an “inflection point” and we want to take Micromax to Eastern Europe, Southeast Asia and Africa soon. Last year, Micromax roped in Hollywood star Hugh Jackman as its brand ambassador to improve and expand its brand presence outside the India and the emerging markets.
Some surveys suggested that you have come close to overtaking Samsung market share in India. What’s your take on this?
We are not afraid of technology and keep satisfying and fulfilling the needs of our Indian and emerging market consumers with the latest technology at best prices, and if that makes us market leaders, we will take it. India is a very large market and there is an opportunity in every price band in the market, and we provide products in every prize range. Feature phone markets are already started to decline. Cheap and low quality products are flooding the market, but such things only create mess in the market. For example, the tablet market has seen such instances where lots of people launched cheap tablets and then the experience is not good and that did not do good for the tablet market segment.
As you already have a good traditional supply channel, why are you launching Canvas Nitro A310 exclusively on Snapdeal.com?
We have of course a range of products that are available outside Sanpdeal. We are launching Canvas Nitro A310 via Sanpdeal because there is a lot of consumer demand online. First we want to fulfill that demand and then may go through our traditional channel market.