Not just iPhone, Indians buy Xiomi handsets too from black market at a premium

Xiaomi customers who buy from Flipkart, resell handsets on a few other e-commerce sites - Quikr, OLX and eBay, at a high premium

It was only Apple's iPhone which was black marketed in India earlier. No other handset had witnessed so much demand that led to black marketing. But, during the past few weeks, smartphones made by China's Xiaomi are being black-marketed at its best.

Of course, Apple's iPhone was smuggled and cracked before being sold in the grey market usually before Apple makes its new iPhone models officially available in Indian market.

For Xiaomi, it's the consumers who buy from Flipkart, Xiaomi's exclusive seller, and resell the handsets on a few other e-commerce sites - Quikr, OLX and eBay, at a high premium.

It's again the unavailability that triggered black marketing. Since it entered the market, Xiaomi's limited flash of smartphones of a particular batch gets sold in thousands with a few seconds on Flipkart. As Xiaomi puts very limited number of handsets on sale in one flash, most of the willing buyers are left in vain.

Taking the advantage, a bunch of consumers who have bought these handsets on Flipkart, then put the smartphones up for sale on Quikr, OLX and eBay asking for a premium, ranging between Rs 2,000 to Rs 10,000 depending on the original price of the device.

Most of them are unopened and sealed packs. Surprisingly, some are seeking buyers even before they have received their devices from Flipkart.

Xiaomi sold 40,000 units of Redmi 1S smartphone, priced at Rs 5,999, within just 4.5 seconds in the second round, while about 3 lakh people registered for the device. This was the second batch. Consumers who had bought Redmi in the first flash are yet to receive their devices as FlipKart will take 12-14 days to deliver. But, there are advertisements on OLX, Quikr and eBay by potential resellers for Redmi. They are asking for a premium of about Rs 1,500 to Rs 2,000.

Interestingly, Xiaomi handsets are also available in the cities grey market. A shop owner at Delhi's Khan market is selling Xiomi Mi3 for 15-20 per cent premium, and bookings for Redmi is in process at the same premium.

The advertisements on the e-commerce portals show sellers from across the country, including metro cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Chennai, Bangalore, and even smaller cities like Surat, Hyderabad.

Flipkart officials have admitted that even if they requested these sites to remove such advertisements, there is very little that Flipkart can do legally. Even Xiaomi officials are aware of the fact, but they have limited options to control the black marketing.

This was initial;lt started after Xiaomi sold all its Mi3 smartphones within a few seconds. Xiaomi had more than six rounds of flash sale where it sold about one lakh units. Each round of flash sale was concluded within a few seconds.

It is not just Xiaomi smartphones. There are Motorola models also getting sold on these portals. However, most of them are used ones.