Reliance Jio beats Huawei to become top player in data cards market

Key highlights:

• Reliance Jio beat Huawei to become the top player in the data cards market
• Reliance Jio's JioFi 3 was the fastest moving model followed by JioFi 2
• Huawei shipments plunged sequentially by 36%

Reliance Jio beat Huawei to become the top player in the data cards market in the second half of FY17. The company saw a 77% growth in data cards in the second half of FY17 in comparison to 12% in first half of FY17, according to a CyberMedia Research (CMR) report.

Reliance Jio's JioFi 3 was the fastest moving model followed by JioFi 2 on number two position. Huawei E3372H-607 was on the third spot.

This has put Reliance Jio in the lead and now has a market share of 86% in Q4 FY17 from 68% in Q3 FY17 and 18% in Q2 FY17.

Huawei shipments plunged sequentially by 36% in 2H FY2016-2017. The vendor’s market share decreased from 33% in 1H FY2016-2017 to 10% in 2H FY2016-2017.

ZTE shipments witnessed 6% sequential growth in 2H FY2016-2017, while other vendors like Alcatel, D-Link saw fall in 2H FY2016-2017.

“Reliance Jio replaced Huawei as the most favored vendor in 2H FY2016-2017, in terms of market share (Unit shipments). Market share of Reliance Jio grew from 12% in 1H FY2016-2017 to 77% in 2H FY2016-2017 due to free data services along with comparatively lower price of its Mi-Fi Data Cards,” said Shipra Sinha, Lead Analyst, Industry Intelligence and Channels Research Practices, CMR said.

The Indian Data Cards market registered 107% jump in 2H FY2016-2017 to 3.6 million over 1H FY2016-2017, in terms of units shipped, according to CMR’s India Data Cards Monthly Market Review Mar-17, June 2017 release.

LTE/4G Data Card shipments witnessed 228% sequential rise to 3.3 million in 2H FY2016-2017. LTE/4G replaced 3G as the most favored technology in the Data Cards market. 3G shipments declined sequentially by 67% in 2H FY2016-2017, when compared to the first half of FY2016-2017.

“Mi-Fi devices led the growth of LTE/4G technology in 2H FY2016-2017. LTE based Mi-Fi devices jumped sequentially by 333% in 2H FY2016-2017,” stated Sinha.

Data Cards with data rate of 150 Mbps contributed around 92% to overall shipments in 2H FY2016-2017.

Around 59% of Data Cards were sold with operator bundling in 1H FY2016-2017 that increased to around 95% in 2H FY2016-2017.

“Mi-Fi devices are expected to show further rise in the future. In-built battery with anywhere, anytime data connectivity because of the various affordable data plans in Mi-Fi devices are the key features contributing to its growth. Large number of user support with a single device is also one of the reasons for the growth in Mi-Fi devices. Significant push by telecom service providers is also making and continue to make Mi-Fi cards the most favored option in India,” Shipra concluded.