Some of the leading retail outlets in India, including Tata Group’s Croma, Future Group, Planet M, Next, Reliance Retail and Sangeetha Mobiles among others have decided to not sell Android One handsets in protest of Google’s decision to initially launch the handsets through e-commerce platforms only, reports The Economic Times. Google launched the first set of low-cost smartphones through its Android One initiative in September this year, in partnership with Indian handset manufacturers Micromax, Karbonn & Spice. The companies had tied-up with separate e-commerce platforms for the launch: Micromax with Amazon India, Karbonn with Snapdeal & Spice with Flipkart. Apparently, sales through these online retailers were below expected levels which led to the handset companies approaching offline retail outlets. That’s when the retail outlets refused to stock and sell Android One handsets. The ET report says only The MobileStore & Univercell are selling the Karbonn smartphone,…
