Honor 9N in India, company aims to continue triple digit growth (Lead)
New Delhi : After breaking into the list of the top five smartphone brands in India in the first quarter of this year, Huawei's sub-brand Honor wants to "redefine" the sub-15K segment with the launch of "Honor 9N" and continue triple digit growth in the country, a top company executive said here on Tuesday.
The company launched the smartphone with notch "Full View" display and 19:9 aspect ratio in three storage variants -- 3GB RAM +32GB internal storage at Rs 11,999, 4GB RAM +64GB onboard storage at Rs 13,999 and 4GB RAM+128GB internal storage variant at Rs 17,999.
"Honor's growth in the past six months has been phenomenal. We have sold 330 per cent more phones in the first half of 2018 compared to what we sold in the 12 months of last year," P Sanjeev, Vice President, Sales, Huawei India-Consumer Business Group, told IANS.
"We are currently growing at a triple digit in India, while the overall smartphone market is growing at 14 per cent," he added.
According to Counterpoint Research, Honor was the fastest growing smartphone brand in India (146 per cent), followed by Xiaomi (134 per cent) and OnePlus (112 per cent) in the first quarter of this year.
"Today's launch is aimed at redefining the sub-15K segment," P Sanjeev, added.
Honor 9N will be available exclusively on Flipkart from July 31 in four colours -- lavender purple, sapphire blue, midnight black and robin egg blue.
The 5.84-inch Full HD+ device has 79 per cent screen to body ratio. It also comes with a 2.5D curved glass design with 12 layers of glass with nano coating finish for a mirror like effect.
Powered by the Kirin 659 processor, the device runs the latest Android 8.0 (Oreo) operating system and houses a 3,000mAh battery.
The smartphone sports dual rear camera (13MP+2MP) and 16MP selfie camera. The front shooter is equipped with the portrait mode feature that can identify the face of the user in the image and achieve accurate Bokeh effects.
The device will soon be upgraded with new graphics processing acceleration technology, GPU Turbo, to allow users good gaming experience, according to P Sanjeev.
"In India, nearly 80 per cent of smartphones are sold in the Rs 10,000-Rs 15,000 segment. This is also the segment which has been the most successful for us. The launch of Honor 9N with crisp new display and innovative features will help us further consolidate our position in this segment," P Sanjeev said.
In the next five years, Honor's aim is to independently become one of the top three smartphone brands globally, he added.
"With the global smartphone market shrinking, India is going to be a very high-potential market if Honor has to establish itself as a global No. 3 smartphone brand," he said.
