fbpx

Cherry Mobile Named #1 Vendor as PH Becomes 3rd Largest Smartphone Market in SEA

The International Data Corporation (IDC) recently published its quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker for the Asia/Pacific region which shows a significant upsurge in mobile phone shipment (smartphone or otherwise) in the Philippines. Along with it comes the news that Cherry Mobile has been named the top smartphone vendor in the country, pulling an upset victory against Samsung who now sits in the far second place.

According to the data that the research firm has gathered, a total of 26.8 million mobile phones were shipped in the Philippines last year, with smartphones accounting to nearly half, 47% to be exact, of the total mobile phone shipments.

Yugatech 728x90 Reno7 Series

The third quarter of 2014 marked the first time that smartphones overtook feature phones in terms of shipment volume, making the Philippines the fourth Southeast Asian country to achieve such feat after Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand.

The reason for the upsurge in the smartphone adoption in 2014, Market Analyst at IDC Philippines Jerome Dominguez said that it’s primarily due to the narrow price gap between smartphones and feature phones with the former giving more bang-for-the-buck.

Smartphone Vendor Ranking

Looking at IDC’s smartphone vendor ranking above, you’ll notice that only two global brands, Samsung and Lenovo, have made it in to the top five, the rest, including Cherry Mobile which dominated the local market in 2014, are all local brands which account to almost 38% of the total market share.

Although the ranking seemed to back up what Dominguez said, Daniel Pang, the Senior Research Manager of the Client Devices group at IDC Asia/Pacific, has a different take as to why these local brands fared very well against more established international players.

“The success of local smartphone players is an offshoot of heavy marketing, celebrity endorsements, and price-competitive offerings. Branding is critical in the Philippines., The thriving local vendors are those that not only offer budget-friendly smartphones, but also produce strong ATL (above-the-line) campaigns and are endorsed by popular celebrities.”

– Daniel Pang, Senior Research Manager of the Client Devices group at IDC Asia/Pacific

The success of the local brands came at the cost of market shares of Chinese brands and other global brands. The latter suffered 7% drop in the total market share which, according to the research firm, can attributed to the continuous decline in popularity of Blackberry and Sony in the Philippines.

The former’s market share, on the other hand, only decreased by a single point last year. IDC believes that with the right marketing push, these Chinese vendors will see an increase in market share this year as they establish a solid footing in the local market.

[Source]

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 976 other subscribers
Avatar for Ronnie Bulaong

This article was written by Ronnie Bulaong, a special features contributor and correspondent for YugaTech. Follow him on Twitter @turonbulaong.

24 Responses

  1. Avatar for Robin San Juan Robin San Juan says:

    Re branded from China

  2. Avatar for Faust Faust says:

    whoa i wonder where is iphone

  3. Avatar for the truth the truth says:

    Local “REBRAND”….

  4. Avatar for abe santos abe santos says:

    Ive owned an omega hd 2.0 and after almost 2 years it decided not to get charged. My sister broke her omega spectrum’s front glass. Both models have no replacement parts.

  5. Avatar for angelo angelo says:

    to author correction please…
    lenovo is not a global smartphone brand.

    • Avatar for jelly troll jelly troll says:

      Ano pala tawag mo sa Lenovo?

      Inter-barangay brand?

    • Avatar for xenter xenter says:

      ayan naman, may nagmamarunong haha. lenovo? hindi global brand? di ka ba updated? lenovo is the no.1 pc brand in the world by shipments

    • Avatar for G4 G4 says:

      lenevo is not a major GLOBAL SMARTPHONE BRAND.
      maybe sa a brand for other electronic products, but not for the smartphone.
      most of its sales are in CHINA and other Asian countries but not in the whole World.

      Lenovo smartphone is not known in most part of the World.

      that’s why IDC put LG and Samsung are the top two GLOBAL smartphone Brands in the Philippine as of 2014.

    • Avatar for G4 G4 says:

      P.C. is not a smartohone.

    • Avatar for G4 G4 says:

      Among the Chinese vendors, Lenovo has the biggest share in the Philippines, snagging the 4th spot in the top 5. Although gaining traction in other regions, Chinese vendors that just recently branched out of China (e.g., OPPO, Xiaomi) have yet to gain ground in the country given limited brand awareness. This may change this year as these new entrants ramp up their marketing efforts.

      Samsung still leads the pack of global vendors, followed by LG Electronics. As a newcomer to the smartphone market, ASUS also gained considerable share last year. The decline of Sony and Blackberry contributed to the drop in the overall share of global vendors in the Philippine smartphone market.

      http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=prTH25504815

    • Avatar for Josh Josh says:

      xenter

      magkaiba ang p.c. sa smartphone.

      basahin mo ang sinabi ng nagpost ang hindi niya sinabi na na p.c.brand ang sinabi niya ay smartphone brand.

      at totoo naman ah ang lenovo ay bumebenta lang sa CHINA at karamihan pa sa benta nila outside china ay dito sa pinas. hindi porket kilala sila sa p.c. ay ibig sabihin ay kilala na din sila sa smartphone worldwide.

      parang Aces kilala lang din sila sa ibang electronic products pero hindi pa ganun sa smartphone lalo na kung GLOBAL Market pag uusapa.

    • Avatar for utoy utoy says:

      Ang tatanga ng mga dummy na to bobo nyo. May nabibiling lenovo dito sa pinas tapos di global brand? Mga pulpol

    • Avatar for and the newwwwwwwww and the newwwwwwwww says:

      keyword dito is GLOBAL.

      hindi major. hindi total sales. at kung ano pa man.

      binibenta sa multiple countries tapos hindi global?

      lenovo company na nga ang motorola hindi pa rin global anag lenovo?

    • Avatar for Lenovo as Chinese Lenovo as Chinese says:

      categorized as Chinese smartphone brand ang Lenovo but not as Global smartphone brand dahil hindi sila nagbebenta ng phones nila sa mas maraming bansa sa Worldwide.
      ang mga Global smartphone brands ay ang Apple, Samsung, LG , Sony.

      ibang usapan na ang pakakakuha nila ng motorola, Lenovo lang ang usapan dito.

      basahin nyo ang report ng IDC para maintindihan niyo.

    • Avatar for jelly troll jelly troll says:

      sabi mo nga.

      Lenovo – inter barangay brand.

      Chinese vendor, Chinese brand but it is also a GLOBAL BRAND.

      For categorizing convenience lang ang Global/Chinese grouping. It means the Chinese brands are emerging to be just as big and prolific as the other brands to merit a “group” of their own.

      Kung meron pa sanang 2-3 brands na galing sa S.Korea na mabenta din, then we will see a Korean “grouping” as well.

  6. Avatar for angelo angelo says:

    The study also indicates that three local smartphone vendors made it to the top 5 smartphone vendors in the Philippines (in unit shipment terms) in 2014. Cherry Mobile was the top smartphone vendor last year, while MyPhone and Torque ranked third and fifth, respectively. Among Chinese vendors, Lenovo has the biggest share in the Philippines, raking 4th in the top 5. Samsung still leads the pack of global vendors, followed by LG Electronics.

  7. Avatar for angelo angelo says:

    1 cherry mobile
    2samsung
    3myphone
    4lenovo
    5torque
    6lg

    samsung and lg are the top2 among major global brands here in the philippines.

  8. Avatar for James James says:

    Well, this is quite a good news, atleast, for me. I would love to see how will the ‘real’ international manufacturers do with it. Asus might win the heart of the masses if the Zenfone 2 will be priced properly. I am no against any local brand as I also patronize them for the affordability and availability. My first smartphone, Sony Xperia Neo V, still works to date and more months to go, I think. But my 1 year and 2month# old Cherry Mobile Flare HD shows unfortunate symptoms. I, as much as possible, would still prefer much renowned brand for quality, after-sales, updates with a right value. I don’t care about what others cry about after sales, I know that engaging with local brands promises nothing but a good priced phone with ‘possible’ compromises.

    • Avatar for ako ito ako ito says:

      You are right james…ako nga cm din gamit ko ngaun…but i experienced last month sa service center nila dto sa cebu-ayala…crowded sa loob at ang init pa. Mabagal sila sa reponses… Maybe kong mag invest ako nang panibagong phone doon nalang ako sa may renowned brand…gaya mo.

  9. Avatar for Ross Ross says:

    Well kahit papano maging proud tayo dyan dahil local brand, pero d lng ako proud mabagal service nila my tablet akong pina servive eh mag 3 months mhigit hindi pa rin ok, my ebidensya sya ako, hindi ito paninira,

  10. Avatar for Zobel Zobel says:

    I’d have expected Starmobile to at least sell more than my phone. Mabuti naman at konti lang nauuto nila.

  11. Avatar for NotaSheep NotaSheep says:

    Now give us the ranks for the worst customer service! :D

    • Avatar for dothackjhe dothackjhe says:

      As much as I liked the brand, I can honestly say that Cherry Mobile’s customer service is one of the worst among existing brands in the country. With its poor response (if at all), it feels like Cherry Mobile’s customer service is in-existent unless you’re talking face-to-face with the people of the department itself.

    • Avatar for abuzalzal abuzalzal says:

      O-plus should come out on top

Leave a Reply
JOIN OUR TELEGRAM DISCUSSION

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *