Top guns not blazing in electronics sector, gain in low-cost device segment

The share of the top five in the volumes of smartphone sales has fallen from 80% in 2022 to 73% as projected for this year even as the overall market has slipped by 2%

The top five brands in electronic devices like smartphones, tablets, and smart TVs have been collectively losing their market or have not been able to regain their dominance this calendar year over that in 2022.

But in “average sale price (ASP)” devices like smartwatches, true wireless stereo (TWS) earphones, and neckbands it is time for consolidation with big brands increasing their share in the growing market, according to the data from Counterpoint Research.

Consider this. The share of the top five in the volumes of smartphone sales has fallen from 80 per cent in 2022 to 73 per cent as projected for this year even as the overall market has slipped by 2 per cent. So the three top brands -- Samsung, Xiaomi, and Realme -- have lost market share. Oppo has stuck to the same levels as last year. Only Vivo has seen an increase -- of 1 per cent.

In tablets too the top five brands have seen a fall -- from 87 per cent in 2022 to 83 per cent projected for 2023. A sharp drop has come from market leader Samsung, whose share of the market fell by a substantial 10 percentage points. The gainers have been Apple, Lava, and Realme.

Even in the smart TV market, the trend has moved away from large brands to smaller or regional brands as well as those built by e-commerce players (like Amazon). The shift was dramatic when the share of those other than the top five increased from 43.2 per cent in 2021 to 57 per cent in 2022, and conceding only 1 percentage point in 2023.

However, looking closely, that was primarily because of TCL, which gained a 2 percentage point market share in 2023 while Xiaomi, Samsung, LG, and One Plus either lost market share or just managed to be on the same level as last year.

Explaining the trend, senior analyst Anshika Jain of Counterpoint said: “In smartphones, ASP is rising as the premium segment has shown growth and the top brands faced decline in market share due to the growth of mid-tier brands. Also, excess channel inventories for top brands impacted shipments, causing high competition from other brands. Smartphones and tablets will continue to dilute their top five brand shares as premiumisation grows.”

However, the trend will be different in other segments.

“We have seen consolidation happening for segments with lower ASPs such as neckband, TWS, and smartwatches. These entry-level products have a smaller replacement cycle and high demand. With steady shipments of entry-level products, top brands will continue to capture more market share focusing on affordable offerings”. 

That is why in smartwatches, the market share of the top five brands (Noise, Fire Boltt, boAt, Samsung and Pebble) climbed to 80 per cent in 2023 over 77 per cent last year. In the TWS earphone market, dominated by boAt (with 41 per cent share), the top five have seen their share consolidate to 69 per cent in 2023 from 66 per cent last year.

And in neckbands too, boAt dominates with the market consolidating in favour of the top five, which now have 67 per cent of it as compared to only 60 per cent last year.