NEWS2 July 2015

India to overtake US in smartphone sales

US — Smartphone sales will grow from 1.5 billion units in 2015 to 1.7bn by 2017, with India overtaking the US as the world’s second largest smartphone market by 2017.

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China will remain the top market for sales, rising to 505 million units by 2017 (from 458m in 2015 ) while India will reach 174m and the US 168m, according to the latest report from Strategy Analytics.

Linda Sui, director at Strategy Analytics, said: “China has been the engine of global smartphone growth in recent years, but China is now maturing and slowing. India is fast becoming the next major growth wave. India’s growth is being driven by low smartphone penetration, expanding retail availability of devices, wealthier middle-class consumers, and aggressive promotions from local smartphone brands like Micromax.”