(SUNDAY) Focus on best service and quality for Indian smartphone users: Oppo (IANS Interview)

Smartphone maker OPPO -- sometimes called the Apple of China -- does bother with sales figures in India, but focuses instead on "best service and quality with beautifulness", a top company executive has said.

According to Sky Li, Vice President, OPPO Mobiles -- which entered India two years back and has seen tremendous growth since -- the company never follows Key Performance Indicators (KPI) -- a measurable way to check how effectively a company is achieving key business objectives.

"Providing best service with beautifulness to the customers is our strategy to grab the Indian smartphone market," Li told IANS on the sidelines of the launch of OPPO F1s, a successor to the popular OPPO F1 device, in Mumbai last week.

"Being a priority market for OPPO, we understand the Indian consumers' demand for excellent camera quality. OPPO has rich experience in camera technology and has been the industry leader with several accolades and awards to its credit," said Li, who is also the OPPO's Global VP and Managing Director of International Mobile Business and President, OPPO India.

The company is carrying this legacy forward and stepping up the selfie revolution by launching the upgraded selfie expert -- F1s -- to share advanced photography technology with an even wider range of users in India and also offer them an outstanding "selfie" experience.

According to a latest report from the International Data Corporation (IDC), Chinese smartphone players like Vivo, Xiaomi, Oppo, LeEco and Gionee had a 22 per cent share of smartphone sales in India in the quarter ended March 31.

Quality brands and players like Oppo now expect to grow in tier II and tier III cities with their large marketing spends and increasing retail presence, the report added.

Speaking about the specifications of F1s, Li said it is an advanced version of the ealier "selfie expert" F1.

"F1s takes selfie experience a step further with 16MP front camera, a sophisticated beautification feature and an industry leading 0.22s fingerprint reader. F1s also sports a 5.5-inch screen, an Octa-core processor backed with 3GB RAM, 32GB ROM and 3075mAh battery at an amazing price of Rs 17,990," Li explained.

Asked about the "Make in India" initiative, Li said: "We had planned to open two manufacturing units in India, both in Noida (Uttar Pradesh). The first factory has already become functional last month."

India is going through a transformation period from feature phones to smartphones. The smartphone user base in India currently stands at 350 million and is expected to rise sharply.

Li feels that the "Make in India" initiative has created a strong platform for the smartphone manufacturers like Oppo.

"Currently, there are many Indian consumers who are using low-end or less-value devices. The time when these customers will switch over to mid- to high-end segment smartphones is an opportunity for us. We are committed to provide our best products," Li told IANS.

(Rajnish Singh can be contacted at rajnish.s@ians.in)

--IANS

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