Ericsson's India share in global sales doubles to 4% in Jan-Jun period

Swedish telecom gear maker Ericsson on Friday said its share of sales from the India market doubled in the first half of the current year 2021 to four per cent, making the country third-highest revenue contributor for the group, according to the company's financial performance report.

India had contributed two per cent to the global sales for Ericsson during January-June 2020.

The United States leads as the biggest market for Ericsson with 34 per cent share in global net sales, followed by Japan with five per cent.

China, which was Ericsson's second-biggest market last year with nine per cent of the total sales, has slipped to fifth rung to 3 per cent.

For the second quarter ended June 30, 2021, Ericsson has posted an eight per cent growth in net sales to 7.1 billion Swedish Krona (SEK) on a constant currency basis in Southeast Asia, Oceania and India, primarily driven by 4G investment in India.

The company had recorded net sales of SEK 6.6 billion in the same period a year ago.

Ericsson said that on an adjusted currency basis, growth in the region was 14 per cent.

"Currency-adjusted sales increased 14 per cent y-o-y. Networks sales increased y-o-y primarily driven by continued investments in LTE (4G), mainly in India, and as a result of timing of project milestones in Southeast Asia," Ericsson said in the financial performance report.

The company's global net sales declined by a per cent to SEK 54.9 billion during the reported quarter from SEK 55.6 billion in the second quarter of 2020.

Ericsson said its organic sales, however, grew 8 per cent globally.

The company experienced a backlash of barring Chinese vendors in Sweden from 5G with a dip in sales of SEK 2.5 billion in mainland China.

In a statement, Ericsson President and CEO Borje Ekholm said, "We are well positioned to take advantage of continued market momentum with our competitive 5G product portfolio and cost structure."

However, Ekholm added, it is prudent to forecast a materially lower market share in mainland China for networks and digital services, as the earlier decision to exclude Chinese vendors from the Swedish 5G networks might influence market share awards.