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Bharti-backed OneWeb announces significant new equity partner

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Hanwha, the South Korean Fortune 500, global technology and manufacturing company has announced a USD $300m equity investment by Hanwha Systems in OneWeb, the Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite communications company backed by Bharti group.

Hanwha brings further defence capabilities and the latest antenna technologies to OneWeb, alongside relationships to new government customers and expanded geographical reach.

This investment brings OneWeb’s total equity investment since November 2020 to USD $2.7bn with no debt issuance. The investment is expected to be completed in the first half of 2022, subject to regulatory approvals.

OneWeb’s first-generation fleet of 648 satellites that will deliver global coverage in 2022 is fully funded. To date, the company has launched 254 satellites into orbit, with another launch planned this August from Baikonur, Kazakhstan. Thanks to the success of recent launches, OneWeb’s network will be ready to offer connectivity services from 50th parallel and above by the end of 2021.

Sunil Bharti Mittal, Founder and Chairman of Bharti Enterprises, said, “We welcome Hanwha to OneWeb. These are exciting and fast paced times in the space sector. With Hanwha alongside, we will be able to access the highest quality of technological thinking and development. They are a powerful partner in our global mission to connect the world.”

Youn Chul KIM, President, Chief Executive Officer and Director at Hanwha Systems, said, “We are pleased to join hands with OneWeb, which has strength in the LEO communication area, the core of space business. To OneWeb’s vision of connecting all the people across the globe, Hanwha System’s satellite and antenna technology will bring more advantages.”

UK Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said, “Today’s $300m investment in OneWeb by Hanwha is the latest in a series of votes of confidence in the company from the market. It’s clear that leading global investors see a promising future for this ground-breaking company and a robust commercial case for investment.”

“The Government’s equity stake in OneWeb not only allows the UK to capitalise on our first-mover advantage to deploy low earth orbit technology but will put our country at the forefront of the small satellite market, which is set to rapidly expand over the years ahead,” adds Kwarteng.

Neil Masterson, Chief Executive at OneWeb, said, “Hanwha brings advanced defence and antenna technology development to the OneWeb line-up. We are all delighted that they have chosen to join us on this journey of innovation, shaping a global service to connect the most remote locations and to provide a critical digital pathway from space to our interconnected world.”

On completion, OneWeb will appoint a board director to represent Hanwha’s share in the company.

Oppo partners with Spotify to bring you personalised playlists that match your mood

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Smartphone brand Oppo today announced its partnership with audio streaming platform Spotify for their latest campaign “Every Emotion In Portrait” to bring personalized playlists to users that suit their moods and emotions.

The tie-up with Spotify is in keeping with Oppo’s latest smartphone Reno6 series’ cameras that allow users to capture “every emotion in portrait” with industry-first Bokeh Flare Portrait Video in professional-grade quality.

Damyant Singh Khanoria, Chief Marketing Officer, Oppo India, said, “We are excited to associate with Spotify, the world’s largest music streaming app, to deepen our relationship with consumers by providing a personalized listening experience. This partnership will allow users to capture their emotions in portrait and listen to their favourite music curated to their moods. Music transcends boundaries and speaks to your deepest emotions and that is what this personalised playlist is designed to do. By understanding how exactly you’re feeling, it fetches music that truly resonates with you.”

Oppo’s partnership with Spotify allows existing users to listen to their favourite songs, along with fresh selections, curated on the basis of moods and emotions. New users are introduced to new playlists and songs that are gradually fine-tuned to the listener’s tastes.

To get your own playlist that’s curated to suit your current mood and emotion, link Spotify to your Oppo Reno6 series and follow these steps:

  1. Go to
  2. You will be prompted to Log in/Sign up to your Spotify account. If you access this page from your computer, you also get an option to skip this step.
  3. Choose from within a matrix of four primary emotions: Happy, Low, Sensitive and Passionate as per your mood. As you slide your cursor between these, you get access to 27 moods like amused, triumphant, calm, satisfied, amazed, affectionate, grateful, romantic, and others — that are fine-tuned to suit exactly how you feel.
  4. Once you choose the mood, you can see the percentage of other listeners who are feeling the same as you at that point; you can also share your emotion captured in a portrait with friends.
  5. You are then presented with a personalized playlist that matches the mood you chose. You can listen to the songs on your computer, and if you have signed in with your login credentials, the playlist will also appear in the ‘Your Library’ section of your Spotify app on your mobile device.

“Spotify is all about personalisation and discovery, and at the core of that experience are playlists. We know that there is a playlist for every emotion and moment. We worked with Oppo to bring the power of our personalisation through a first of its kind digital experience to launch the Reno6, where users can get a playlist personalised to their current mood. We are excited to partner with Oppo in this #EmotionsInPortrait campaign and look forward to a fantastic reception to the Reno6,” said Arjun Ravi Kolady, Head of Sales, Spotify India.

Paytm Wealth Community records over a million learning minutes with top experts

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Digital financial services platform Paytm today announced that its wholly-owned subsidiary Paytm Money has recorded over a million learning minutes across 100-plus sessions for its video-based Paytm Wealth Community. The video-based platform aims to revolutionize how Indians learn, discuss and trade in the capital markets from top industry experts.

The platform enables users to attend live sessions conducted by subject matter experts across an array of wealth topics like Stocks, F&O, IPO, ETFs, Mutual Funds, Gold, Fixed Income and Personal Finance. Users can learn from experts, interact with them to clarify doubts, and also chat with other users on the platform to discuss various wealth-related topics. The platform is now offering free access to all recorded expert sessions to users to help them understand or refer back to various wealth subjects.

Paytm Wealth Community platform has been designed for the needs of the new Indian investor.  The platform is intuitive to use, and creators on the platform currently offer 30 to 60 min video sessions in English, Hindi and Hinglish, with plans to offer sessions in languages like Gujarati and Tamil planned in the near future.

It also enables subject matter experts and experienced investors in the capital markets to become content creators and share their knowledge with millions of budding investors. Creators on the platform include the likes of Mayuresh Joshi (Head of Research at William O’Neil India), Vishal Malkan (Founder of Malkansview), Ajit Mahuli (Founder of learnpriceactiontrading.com), and Swapnil Pawar (Founder and CEO of Asqi Advisors).

Vishal Mehta, founder of MarketScanner.in and a popular creator on the platform, said, “The new generation of traders today like to learn via visual media, on mobile, and in a language, they are comfortable with. Paytm Wealth community gives the users exactly what they want. The sessions on the platform are short, crisp, offered during both market and non-market hours, and delivered by who’s who of the industry. The usefulness of this to the end-user is undeniable”

Varun Sridhar, CEO, Paytm Money, said, “Millennials love to chat and interact with other investors, and learn much more from such peer-to-peer discussions vs the more traditional learning approaches. Paytm Wealth Community was designed to make these interactions seamless, and the traction we have received has been overwhelming. The platform has a very exciting product and technology roadmap and is 100% free for all users.”

The Paytm Wealth community is owned and operated by OCL Ltd. (Paytm) and is currently being offered across mobile and web to all Paytm Money platform users.The video-based platform aims to revolutionize how Indians learn, discuss and trade in the capital markets from top industry experts

Creative Galileo crosses 3 million downloads after its debut last year

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EdTech trailblazer Creative Galileo, which announced its debut in July 2020, has crossed a record-breaking 3 million downloads with over 5,00,000 monthly active users for its ‘Kids Early Learning App’. In the next 12-14 months, the company aims to achieve 10 million downloads. The educational learning app, aimed at children between the ages of 3 and 8 years, has registered a rating of 4.5 on Play Store and continues to make headway.

The App has become popular among kids and parents for its innovative mechanism to make learning fun and engaging through fascinating stories delivered through kids’ favourite characters. It also offers individualised and customised experiences, success rates and graphs, which help parents keep track of children’s performance through the inbuilt parents’ zone.

Attributed the success to her team and reiterated its motto of making education accessible, Prerna A Jhunjhunwala, Founder, Creative Galileo, said, “We are delighted to achieve this growth in such a short span. The early years of a child’s development are crucial for a strong foundation for the future. We are continually striving to build on the initial success of Creative Galileo by increasing more and more inclusive and relatable content and are strategically selecting edutainment content that can offer crucial reinforcement for learning. We aim to continue making learning immersive for children while keeping the entire process fun.”

After the App’s remarkable success with the first character Little Singham, Creative Galileo plans to add more famous International and Indian characters such as Chakra, Shaktimaan, Bahubali, Big Bees Jr, and Little Krishna to its platform soon, along with vernacular languages for localised learning. The company has tied up with leading animation studios to bring popular characters on board. With 10% downloads recorded from Nepal, Bangladesh, UAE and Pakistan, the App is also gaining traction in the international markets.

The desire for quality education has projected India’s Edtech sector to become a $30 billion industry in the next ten years on the backing of growing demand and strengthening business models and estimates the current industry size between $2.75 – 3.00 billion.

Defence personnel can now avail CSD benefits on consumer durables at Samsung Smart Plazas

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Consumer electronics major Samsung is celebrating this Independence Day with a brand new initiative for defence personnel. Serving and retired defence personnel can now avail Canteen Stores Department (CSD) rates while buying Samsung TVs and digital appliances such as air conditioners, refrigerators, microwaves and washing machines from select Samsung Smart Plaza stores as well, in addition to CSD depots.

This initiative is aimed at enhancing buying experience and offering a wider range of Samsung products to defence personnel at select Samsung Smart Plazas across the country. Samsung Smart Plazas offer an exclusive and complete range of consumer electronics and Samsung Experience Consultants (SECs) at these stores ensure that consumers get live demos and detailed understanding of product features, the company said in a statement.

“Keeping in mind the upcoming festive season, Samsung has created a one-of-its-kind initiative by offering CSD benefits at Samsung Smart Plazas to defense personnel and their families. This Independence Day, our endeavour through this program is to create an intimate brand experience by enhancing shopping convenience for them. We hope to continue adding value to their lives with our innovative products and services,” said Raju Pullan, Senior Vice President, Consumer Electronics Business, Samsung India.

5G roll out in India points to a potential 10 times increase in median download speeds: Ookla

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The imminent launch of 5G network in India has the potential to increase the median download speeds (5G vs 4G-LTE) up to 10 times from the current position, revealed Ookla in its latest insights. The findings are based on Speedtest data from other markets in Asia that have recently launched 5G (Thailand and the Philippines both launched 5G in Q1 2020 and Q2 2020 respectively) that shows the differential between 4G-LTE and 5G speeds was on average approximately 9-10x in Q2 2021.

As India gears up for the launch of 5G network on its 75th Independence Day, Ookla, the global leader in internet testing, has released its insights on the impact of the recent allocation of spectrum and roll out of 5G technology on the overall network performance of the country.

According to Ookla, as of June 2021, 64.5% of 4G users in India could expect to achieve download speeds in excess of 5 Mbps, the speed required to stream HD video content, up from 52.9% in March. It’s impossible to say exactly how fast 5G will be for the average Indian user, given uncertainty over exact spectrum allocations and rollout plans (including the radio access network and improvements to backhaul and transport networks), but it’s safe to say 5G will bring a considerable bump to overall speeds in the country, underlined Ookla.

The data mapped by the global leader in internet testing is already showing an increase in Jio’s performance since March 2021. The operator’s median download speeds have increased from 5.96 Mbps in March 2021 to 13.08 Mbps in June. Its upload speeds and Consistency Score (% of samples which exceed 5 Mbps download and 1 Mbps upload) also saw considerable improvements. Additionally, the NPS score (the relative weight of a brand’s promoters and detractors) also rose from -46.37 in March, to -25.93 in June.

Currently, India clearly lags behind the markets that have already begun the 5G deployments, such as the U.K. and U.S. However in recent months, all operators have been working behind the scenes to help drive 5G commercialization. They are conducting 5G trials and have shown impressive 5G speeds.

The insights by Ookla further stated that the delay in the 5G rollout would eventually benefit the operators as they can procure the network equipment at a lower cost. The adoption of Open RAN system by the Indian operators will further aid in bringing down the overall cost of 5G rollout, as per the findings.

The 5G smartphone prices have already fallen and this trend will continue, spurred in India by partnerships such as Jio Platform’s with Google. Ookla is already witnessing a growing number of Speedtest results running on 5G capable devices in India, which indicates that there will be a pre-installed user base that operators can target from day one of launch.

India’s First Mini LED from TCL now available offline at Reliance Digital

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Global giant TCL has joined hands with Reliance Digital and announced the launch of India’s first Mini LED in the offline market. This new technology Mini LED has been the talk of the town for quite some time, but the good thing now is that the customers can directly walk-in at the Reliance Digital stores and experience next level entertainment. The Mini LED is available in different screen sizes. Featuring Quantum Dot Technology, the Mini LED promises to offer user-friendly interactive home entertainment experience.

Mike Chen, General Manager, TCL India, says, “The launch of Mini LED affirms TCL’s commitment to constant innovation and delivering excellence in terms of cutting-edge technologies to the new-age users. The brand since its inception has been focusing on both online as well as offline sales and the availability of Mini LED at our offline partner store will certainly give our prospective customers a chance to experience ultimate entertainment themselves. As a brand we promise our customers to redefine their smart TV space with our latest offering. This offline launch will also enhance the brand’s leadership stance in the offline market.”

TCL Mini LED TVs in India

The Mini LED comes loaded with quite unique and interesting features. One of the key highlights of the product is the use of Mini LED technology which promises to offer better wide colour gamut performance coupled with high contrast ratio and HDR. It is also supported by local dimming that gives the viewers a totally immersive viewing experience. The use of mini LEDs will also result in thinner and lighter product design.

Next in line is a very interesting feature known as the MagiConnect, which allows the users to connect their TV to their smartphone and perform various tasks comfortably. Users will now be able to take screenshots of live TV, share content via social media, cast audio and video and much more.

The TV also comes with Dolby Vision IQ that enables the device to deliver absolutely stunning pictures in the room every moment. Along with this, the TV also packs 120Hz MEMC and TCL’s exclusive algorithm that makes viewing action-packed content glitch free. The Game Master with dedicated HDMI 2.1 port is an added advantage of the TV for the gamers that enable them to play even high-quality games with smoother processing and powerful optimization. The Magnetic Camera is the cherry on the cake that will now allow you to make and take video calls via the Google Duo app. In addition to all this, the device also features IMAX Enhances certification, ONKYO soundbar with Dolby Atmos along with built-in subwoofers that ensures that the customers get a theater-like experience at home. The TCL Smart UI ensures that you can easily and comfortably control all your smart devices through your TV.

MapmyIndia announces solutions for drone companies, launches innovation challenge

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MapmyIndia, the homegrown digital data and technology products and platforms company for maps, geospatial and location-based IoT, has come up with its solutions for the burgeoning drone industry. It also launched the Drone Innovation Challenge 1.0 in partnership with Drone Federation of India (DFI), a premier industry body that promotes drone-tech and strives towards building a safer and scalable unmanned aviation industry.

According to MapmyIndia, its solutions for drones are targeted to empower drone manufacturers, drone service providers, drone solution developers and drone users and enterprise customers. These solutions include products, platforms, and APIs for advanced and interactive 2D, 3D, 4D and HD digital mapping, GIS, geospatial analytics and AI, as well as real-time drone identification and tracking IoT and flight operations automation.

The companies can register and apply to the Drone Innovation Challenge and those qualified, will be given free access of up to Rs 4 lakh each worth of MapmyIndia’s solutions, usage credits and technical support. Winners of the challenge will be showcased widely and get up to Rs 1 crore or more worth of joint go-to-market support, business opportunities and funding support opportunities.

Details about MapmyIndia’s solutions for drones and the MapmyIndia-DFI Drone Innovation Challenge 1.0 can be found at .

Rohan Verma, CEO and Executive Director, MapmyIndia, said, “The Government of India introduced path-breaking regulatory reforms in the geospatial industry in February 2021, which liberalised, unshackled and unleashed the potential of the indigenous geospatial industry, for which we at MapmyIndia are extremely grateful. Similarly, they have started consultations for the draft Drone Rules 2021 which are aimed at liberalising the drone sector, which is a very welcome and progressive step.”

“India’s drone market will grow rapidly to a size of worth USD 1.8 billion by 2026, and we are focused on enabling, the best, most cutting edge drone solutions that positively benefit the Indian industry, economy and society and ensure our country’s and citizens’ safety, security and privacy. We are excited about the MapmyIndia-DFI partnership and are inviting drone manufacturers, service providers and solutions developers to participate in the Drone Innovation Challenge 1.0. In the past few years, we have funded and partnered with various drone startups and ecosystem players. We will help the winners of the Drone Innovation Challenge 1.0 and further scale up the indigenous ecosystem with joint go-to-market business and funding opportunities,” added Verma.

Smit Shah, Director, Drone Federation of India, said that India is projected to become one of the largest markets for drones. “While we focus on manufacturing drones in India, it is also crucial that we leverage India’s existing software development expertise to develop an indigenous suite of software solutions to create significant value addition for the drone ecosystem. We aim to find, support and promote such indigenous solutions as a part of this challenge,” said Shah.

“The MapmyIndia-DFI Drone Innovation Challenge 1.0, a unique competition, has been especially designed to encourage innovation at the grass-root levels, with an appeal for innovation-driven tech companies. This challenge, the first in a series of initiatives that have been jointly planned will help create new technologies and solutions that will not only enhance the utility of drones across sectors, but also make them accessible to millions of Indians,” he added.

Companies and innovations invited for Drone Innovation Challenge

Companies manufacturing drones, providing services based on drones, or building software solutions for drones are invited to apply for the Challenge and encouraged to leverage MapmyIndia’s products, platforms, APIs, and solutions to innovate and build:

  • Drones and drone components and sensors that help in surveying, mapping, surveillance, inspection, delivery and transportation use cases across various enterprise, government, agriculture, mining, smart city, law enforcement, security and defence verticals.
  • Drones meant for consumer, recreational and travel and tourism applications including geo-tagged photography and videography etc.
  • Map-based drone software solutions like interactive ground control systems, drone fleet management solutions, industry-specific drone data processing and visualization platforms, unmanned drone traffic management solutions, drone delivery systems, drone surveillance and inspection solutions
  • Drone monitoring, tracking and security systems, and solutions that help identify and counter rogue drones.

Tech NewsWrap: Mi Mix 4 launched with under display camera… and more

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Mi Mix 4 launched with under display camera

Mi Mix 4 smartphone is now official. Xiaomi has expanded its Mi Mix series phone lineup in its home country China. Xiaomi founder Lei Jun, during a launch event, unveiled the Mi Mix 4 alongside Mi Pad 5 and Mi TV OLED line-up. The latest device comes with a new camera technology that hides the front-facing sensor under the display. The company calls the camera ‘Camera Under Panel’ (CUP). For now, these are China-exclusive launches and there’s no clarity on when these products will be launched in India. The price of Mi Mix 4 has been set at CNY 4,999 (approx Rs 57,400) for the 8GB RAM + 128GB storage variant, while the 8GB + 256GB model that is priced at CNY 5,299 (Rs 60,800) and a 12GB + 256GB variant at CNY 5,799 (Rs 66,600).

Samsung Galaxy A10 gets Android 11 update in India

According to a report, the update to Android 11 for the A10 is already rolling out in India, although this may be a staged affair as usual, meaning that it could take a few days (or more) for the notification to pop up on all the units out there in the wild. The new version is labeled A105FDDU6CUH2, and in addition to the bump in the Android version, it also brings Samsung’s One UI 3.1 and the August 2021 security patch level.

HP launches new ENVY notebooks in India

PC and printer major HP brought the new ENVY notebook portfolio with two devices to India that start from Rs 104,999. The ENVY 14 and ENVY 15 notebooks are aimed at creative professionals and multi-tasters in the country, offering a seamless experience as they shift between different modes of creative output. The HP ENVY 14 is available in Natural Silver colour at a starting price of Rs 104,999, while the HP ENVY 15 (Natural Silver colour) will cost you Rs 154,999.

Jio may not be able to replicate Indian success in Europe: UBS

Reliance industries may not be able to replicate the success of its India telecoms operations in Europe with a potential bid for T-Mobile Netherlands, brokerage UBS has said after a newswire report said RIL is weighing a bid for Deutsche Telecom’s Dutch arm. The Mukesh Ambani-led conglomerate’s telecom arm Reliance Jio Infocomm has “benefitted from relatively unique circumstances in the India market, which might not necessarily be replicable in Europe,” UBS mentioned.

You can now skip chapters in YouTube videos

YouTube is getting a new fast forward and rewind feature that lets the users skip chapters while playing a video. Users with a two finger double tap can skip ahead or backwards to the next and previous chapter in a YouTube video. As per a report by Android Police, the new two-finger double-tap feature for YouTube was first discovered by a Reddit user (@u/magnatronmusic31). The feature is said to be an addition to the newly launched video scrubbing gesture on YouTube.

Smartphone market returns to normalcy in India, clocks 34 mn unit shipments in June quarter: IDC

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Although the smartphone market started 2Q21 (April-June) on a low note amidst the second wave of COVID-19 in India, it quickly recovered towards the end of the quarter, witnessing 86% year-over-year (YoY) growth to reach 34 million units, as per a report by International Data Corporation.

The second wave of the deadly pandemic hit the country almost a year after the first wave but varied significantly in terms of market response. Infections spread much faster even in rural areas and had a higher mortality rate, but there was a lesser impact on manufacturing and logistics, while the lockdown was not as strict as the year before. As a result, state-led lockdowns resulted in a few pockets recovering faster in the second quarter, generating pent-up demand in June this year, revealed IDC’s Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.

“While 2021 is expected to see single-digit growth, 2H21 is likely to drop in comparison to the same period last year, with lower demand, uncertainties around the third wave, persistent supply constraints, and rising component prices along with intensifying inflationary rates. Nevertheless, a rebound in 2022 will be possible with upgraders in the low-mid price segments, supply-led push of 5G devices, feature phone migration with new offerings expected in upcoming months (as announced by Reliance Jio), and better supplies to market,” said Navkendar Singh, Research Director, Client Devices and IPDS, IDC India.

Key market trends

Accelerated growth of the online channel, led by etailers, resulted in a record share of 51% with a massive 113% YoY growth. On the flip side, the offline channel was impacted by weekend curfews in many areas and partially opened markets (with odd/even schemes) through May and mid-June.

MediaTek-based smartphones continued to lead with a share of 64% in sub-US$200, while Qualcomm dominated the space in the US$200-500 segment with a 71% share.

India stood at fourth position, following PRC, USA, and Japan, in terms of 5G shipments of 5 million with the lowest ASP at US$410. Though the government is yet to roll out the spectrum, IDC expects an inflow of more affordable 5G devices by end-2021 at sub-US$200.

Overall ASPs surged to a high of US$184, growing by 15% YoY. Price hikes and an ongoing shift to 5G in upcoming quarters drives ASPs to peak in 2021/2022.

“Though there were aggressively priced 5G model launches in 2Q21, most shipments were 4G. Nevertheless, it is still months away from 5G to become mainstream, underlining the importance of spectrum availability, clear use cases, and ensuring a cohesive future-ready infrastructure led by telcos,” said Upasana Joshi, Associate Research Manager, Client Devices, IDC India.

Top 5 brands

Xiaomi led with an impressive 84% YoY growth. Poco, Xiaomi’s sub-brand, emerged as the fastest-growing brand nationally, despite a smaller model portfolio and being exclusive to Flipkart. Xiaomi commanded a 40% online market share with almost 70% of its shipments in online channels. Also, Xiaomi surpassed Samsung for the third slot in the offline channels with an 18% market share.

Samsung was second, registering the lowest YoY growth amongst the top 10 vendors at 15% in 2Q21. The vendor faced severe supply shortages. Its offline channel remained muted with a 4% decline, but its online shipments grew by 46% YoY, accounting for 49% of its total shipments.

Vivo came at the third position, with 57% YoY growth. Though it continued to remain offline-heavy, it had new launches under the iQOO series, which were online-led. With 64% growth in the offline channel, Vivo continued to command a majority share with its affordable Y series.

Realme surpassed Oppo for the fourth slot with shipment growth of 175% YoY in 2Q21. It also overtook Samsung for the second slot within the online space with a 19% share, offering affordable 4G/5G models. Amongst the top 5 vendors, Realme had the highest 5G contribution and led the space with a 23% share in 2Q21.

Oppo slipped to the fifth slot, but with shipment growth of 123% YoY in 2Q21. 17% of Oppo shipments were 5G, claiming third place in the 5G market after Realme and OnePlus. It also surpassed Samsung for the second slot in offline channels at a 20% market share.