Reliance Jio owned LYF smartphones recorded a 13% market share among all LTE smartphones shipped in India during Q1 FY16, said a report by Cyber Media Research (CMR). LYF smartphones held the third place among the top three vendors shipping LTE smartphones in India; Samsung held the first place with a 32% market share while Lenovo held the second with a 14% market share. In the previous year, Xiaomi held the third place among LTE devices in India with a 10% market share during Q4 FY15, according to data released by CMR. The latest development comes after research firm IDC said that LYF smartphones accounted for 7.1% of India’s entire smartphone market in terms of device shipments during Q1 FY16. LYF smartphones also over took Lava as the fifth largest smartphone vendor in the same quarter. In the preceding quarter, Lava held a 7% market share. How LYF smartphones are slowly acquiring market share LYF branded devices entered the market during Q4 FY15, i.e. around late January. At the time launch, 3 smartphone models were available for purchase at Reliance Digital stores only. Currently, Reliance Jio has 14 different models with LTE in their smartphone portfolio, which is available through Reliance stores and other ecommerce sites as well. It has 4 models below Rs 15,000; 5 other models below Rs 10,000; and 4 other device models under Rs 5000. Its costliest phone is Rs 19,500. Reliance Jio missed launch of its commercial telecom services in March this year. So the…
