Samsung Electronics is having a dream run in its mobile business in India, the world’s fastest growing, price-conscious market. The South Korean consumer electronics giant credits this to strong sales of its mid-tier products, particularly its new Galaxy J series phones. It has also revamped its line-up packed with special features including a safety mode for motorcyclists. “Globally as well as in India, our success has been marked by innovation which revolves around the consumer. We are constantly in the pursuit of meaningful innovations that make people’s lives better. S bike mode is a result of that vision,” Asim Warsi, senior vice-president, Samsung India Electronics tells Sudhir Chowdhary in a recent interaction. Excerpts:
What is the new innovation Samsung is talking about?
We have launched a new mobile innovation, that is, the Samsung Galaxy J3 featuring the S bike mode, which is an industry-first dedicated feature for two-wheeler riders that is designed to enable responsible and tension free riding. This feature or this experience that we are introducing, it’s a whole new one. This S bike mode is born out of an extended period of understanding the consumer and consumer behaviour which got us to certain summary understandings. A large swath of mobile phone owners are two wheeler owners who are inundated with lots of incoming calls and many of them are not necessarily important; they could be sales or insurance calls. Thus the ride experience is compromised when you are riding and have a phone on you.
We recognised that and put it to our R&D folks in India. We have a massive R&D establishment in India, it’s actually the world’s largest R&D establishment outside of Korea. Our folks in India built on this platform, this feature which is the S bike mode. All the user needs to do is switch on the S bike mode of Galaxy J3 before setting off on the ride, and the smartphone will automatically inform the caller that the user is currently riding a bike and is unable to take the call. The caller may choose to press 1 to express urgency to talk to the biker for which the biker will have to bring his bike to a halt in order to take the call.
Samsung is constantly in the pursuit of meaningful innovations that make the people’s lives better. S bike mode is a result of that vision. It will promote responsible riding.
At a macro-level, what are the key attributes for your success in India?
If you look back at Samsung over the last couple of decades or closer in the last five to seven years, specifically if you look at our success both globally as well as in India, I think the bedrock of that has really been our quest for continuous innovation; an innovation that does not happen in isolation, it really begins at the consumer. Consumer is at the epicentre of all insides or knowledge or understanding. Our innovation, be it in the form of our R&D team, sales, marketing and manufacturing operations—everything is built around understanding the consumer. That’s really I think is the core aspect of what helps Samsung appeal to millions across the world over the years including in India.
If you look back, whether it was the advent of dual SIM technology, touch screen technology or smart phone technology, we really put in a lot of effort to take it to the next level for consumers time after time. S bike mode too was developed and built into the Galaxy J3 following extensive market research aimed to create innovations that are really meaningful and useful to people.
Growth expectations from India operations are very high…
It holds true for any thriving and vibrant business and we are clearly a player in that. Growth is always something we are seeking out. But let me tell you that growth for the sake of growth will not happen and we recognise that. That is why we are continuously living closely with our consumers, understanding their shifting needs and preferences. Also very often, it’s not consumers which can show us and tell us; it’s also our R&D knowledge which tells us this is what we can do differently. As technology leaders we know there’s so much more we can do for the consumers.
Aren’t you perturbed by the fact that Chinese brands have taken the Indian market by storm?
Over the years, world over and in India we have always worked in a great healthy competitive environment. We genuinely believe that’s necessary because it challenges everyone, it challenges us as well to think ahead to think deeper, to think better and more innovatively. It gets the best out of everybody in the whole process and it has only helped us and aided us to grow.
If you look at the last year of 2015 up till February 2016 which is the last GFK market share data that got published, we have made some significant gains in market share. So leave alone being threatened, we have certainly being challenged and it helped us actually grow. J series is testimony of that, it’s been highly successful among Indian consumers. They have lapped it up and I think J3 built with the S bike is going to be yet another step in that direction. Over the 12 month period if you look at it we had latched up exactly 10% point share and in January and February we further climbed on that. It’s been a good run for us, in fact every single month we have steadily gained share.
Talk to us about some key market trends in the mobile space and how Samsung is aligned with them to
address the requirements of the industry?
If you look at it globally, and it applies very much in India as well, consumers are looking for the next life enhancing and imagination enhancing experience. In that domain we have made major inroads in wearables and virtual reality (VR) technology—two extremely important and new-age stuff that we are in the midst of right now and lots more to unfurl over their world over and in India.
If you look at India itself, I think one of the important changes in the telecom sector is the whole 4G roll out. I think 4G is usually exciting and important and we have caught it early on itself. The best 4G experience is aided through ultra-data saving (UDS) or Super AMOLED experience or enhanced battery and system performance experience; we have already been building and sharpening that.
So I think whether it’s 4G technology, wearable technology, VR content or VR experiences, we are pushing the envelopes on those fronts.
Almost all the brands talk about quality and experience. What, according to you, are the key differentiators to make a mark?
For Samsung, quality is a non-negotiable thing. Over the years probably if one of our biggest thrust has been internally inside, Samsung is ensuring quality is what comes out of our factories, whether it is in hardware, software, design, or any sort of R&D. So quality is non-negotiable and we have on the back of really solid stable products and robust quality, notwithstanding that strength itself, we still go ahead and back it up with the largest after sales network of any electronics company in the country. We have a robust front-end technology delivery and a back-end after sales service network to catch if there are any quality issues still being faced.
What will be your strategy going forward for the India market?
Some things we will not change and that is our DNA of innovation and DNA for making for Indian consumers and making for India. I think that’s a DNA that is core to us over all the years we have been present in India. In fact, that’s something we are only sharpening and tightening the locks on. We are getting only further motivated for
innovating and innovating around the real Indian consumer.
