Optiemus eyes 10% of India's premium phone market with BlackBerry

Optiemus Infracom, which holds the rights for manufacturing and distribution of BlackBerry phones in India and other countries, aims to garner 10 per cent share of the domestic premium smartphone market by the end of this year.

BSE-listed Optiemus had signed a licensing deal with BlackBerry last year which includes rights for India, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh and Nepal.

Blackberry has a similar partnership with TCL for some other markets.

Optiemus Infracom Executive Director Hardip Singh said the company plans to scale up its product portfolio by bringing in a number of models across price segments.

"Year 2018 will be significant for our business and we are targeting a 10 per cent market share in India in the Rs 20,000-plus premium segment category by end of this year," he told PTI.

The company recently expanded to Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

"We are looking at launching BlackBerry KEYone Limited Edition Black in Nepal in the first quarter of 2018, which will mark the entry of Optiemus in Nepal," he said.

Singh said the company makes the devices in India and will continue to explore opportunities in these key markets.

"We expect International markets to contribute approximately 25 per cent of our total business volume to BlackBerry business by the end of calendar year 2018," he added.

Once a dominant player in the smartphone category, BlackBerry struggled to compete against global competitors like Samsung and Apple. It, then, agreed to license its brand to handset manufacturers TCL and Optiemus.

India is one of the fastest growing smartphone markets globally. Players like Samsung, Xiaomi, Lenovo and vivo have aggressively eaten into the market share of domestic players like Micromax and Lava.

The premium category in the Indian market, although niche, has been growing at a strong pace. Brands like Apple, Samsung and OnePlus are locked in an aggressive battle to capture larger chunk of this segment as it offers higher margins.