Tablet sales in India: Samsung beats Micromax, Apple

India's tablet market has shown early signs of recovery in the second quarter of 2014 after taking a sharp hit in the past couple of quarters, according to International Data Corporation (IDC).

The tablet market shipment in India stood at 0.86 million units in Q2 2014, a quarter-on-quarter growth of 9 per cent over Q1 2014.

“This recovery was fuelled by multiple factors. Business sentiments have shown improvement post elections and near term prospects are anticipated to remain better too. Further, traditional PC OEMs have started making big inroads in the tablet market and most of this success is led by leveraging their vast expanded reach through multiple distribution points,” says  Karan Thakkar, Senior Market Analyst, IDC India.

Take a look at the top 5 players in India…

Samsung
Rank: 1
Market share: 19%

With 19 per cent market share, Samsung rules supreme in India. Majority of its volume is driven by sub $200 voice calling tablets, says IDC.

Android continues to be the most preferred operating system. With 89.6 per cent market share, Android is expected to sail above 80 per cent mark over the next few years, says a IDC report. Windows OS is also gaining ground. 

Micromax
Rank: 2
Market share: 14%

Strong performance in the second quarter  helped Micromax beat Apple.

Tablets with screen size 7 to 8 inched contributed to 88 per cent of the overall market in Q2 CY2014. However on the low volume side, tablets with screen size 10 to  11inch grew by 54 per cent in Q2 CY2014, says IDC.

Apple
Rank: 3
Market share: 9%

More than 60 per cent of the overall iPad volume is being supported by their iPad mini.

Lenovo
Rank: 4
Market share: 7%

“The combined share of PC OEMs in the India tablet market is expected to beat industry growth in the coming quarters,” adds Thakkar.

Datawind
Rank: 5
Market share: 6%

Datawind is catching up with a 6 per cent share.

According to Kiran Kumar, Research Manager, Client Devices IDC India, “Improved discretionary spends by end users and festive buying is expected to drive growth in the tablet market in the coming quarters. IDC anticipates this to be well supported by the optimism witnessed around enterprise IT spending in the recent past”.