Be A Part Of Brand Saga
To Read This Full Story
Welcome
Be A Part Of Brand Saga
Share your own story with us
And Get Published In Brand Saga
Mi India: i-Phone of Indian middle class family
In April 2010, Lei Jun, along with six of his colleagues, started an electronic company called Xiaomi Corporation, which was to compete against all smartphone companies in near future. The whole team was a group of experts; one was the manager of the Google China project and the other was the president of Google China engineering. Lei Jun himself had left his position as CEO of Kingsoft.
When Xiaomi was launched in the market, it was predicted to be a huge success. Along with smartphones, Xiaomi has achieved many milestones by making tablets, laptops, earphones, fitness bands, smart TVs, mobile apps, power banks, Bluetooth speakers and many more.
***
The roller coaster ride of MI's success is worth doing. How did an unknown brand touch the entire Indian consumer?
Lee June and his colleagues were aiming to provide the world with an operating system easier than android. Within four months of the company's establishment, MIUI - an Android-related operating system, was built to match Samsung's TouchWiz and Apple's iOS. At the same time, the craze for smartphones also began to rise from the beginning of the 21st century. Assuming 1+1 is equal to 11 rather than 2, the smartphone was also launched.
Exactly one year after the launch of the MIUI system, the first smartphone called Mi1 was launched. People also responded well to the system that mixed MIUI firmware with Android installation. Mi1 has shaken the smartphone market in Asia and East Asia.
With the launch of the smartphone, Xiaomi became the fourth company in the world to make its own mobile chip after Apple, Samsung and Huawei. Lei Jun, founder and CEO of Xiaomi, was a fan of Steve Jobs since college days. He was so impressed with Steve Jobs that at the Mi1 launch event he tried to look like Steve Jobs in a dark shirt and light jeans. Keeping in mind the success of Mi1, in early 2012, Mi2 was launched with an updated system. Then in 2013, Lei Jun announced the creation of a 47-inch 3D smart TV and formed an alliance with Sony's supplier, Vistara Corporation, for its assembly. The Mi3 was launched in the same year. 2013 was going to be a golden year for Xiaomi. The company became the fifth-largest smartphone brand with sales of nearly 20 million smartphones in 2013.
In 2014, the company first moved out of China to Singapore to build its first international headquarters, keeping in mind the growing size of Xiaomi. In June 2014, the first ever Xiaomi Redmi and Mi3 phones were launched in Singapore. Within three minutes, all the opening-sale smartphones were sold out. In November 2014, the company decided to invest $ 1 billion in smart TVs and became the largest private technology company with a market capitalization of $ 45 billion in December. In the same year, the company sold 60 million smartphones and proved itself as a global leader.
In 2015, the company stepped into India, world's second-largest smartphone market. The company started selling smartphones in India through major e-commerce companies like Flipkart and Amazon. For Xiaomi, India proved to be ‘icing on the cake’. You must remember that every Wednesday at 12 noon, the RedMi 1S sale was started on Flipkart, for which you had to be registered in advance because demand had reached the top with the launch in India. In a maximum of 3-4 minutes, all smartphones were selling out. Mr. Ratan Tata, chairman of Indian business tycoon and Tata Group, has also made an investment in Xiaomi. In September 2016, Xiaomi's smartphones became official in the European Union with the ABC Data Partnership. Mi then surpassed Samsung by selling about 10 million phones in the third quarter of 2017 and became the largest smartphone brand.
In May 2018, the company released its IPO. The IPO generated a huge capital of about $10 billion, the largest IPO since 2014. Thus, the company registered with the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in 2018 with a public offering. In 2019, Xiaomi ranked 468th in the Fortune Global 500. With 125 million phones sold, Xiaomi became the fourth largest smartphone brand in the world and India's first smartphone brand.
The low prices of Xiaomi smartphones was the main reason for keeping behind brands like Samsung. Xiaomi's strategy was to sell the phone at the price of BOM (Bill of Material) and for a long time in the market, which would control the price and make profits. This means a "Win-Win" situation for both the company and the customer. Indeed, they wanted to make a profit from software by keeping the price of hardware at BOM that would make more smartphones sold at a lower price. Xiaomi kept its newly launched phones in the market for 18 months, while other companies launched new models every 6 months.
Hugo Barra, a former Google employee and vice-president of Xiaomi from 2014 to 2017, probably said the truth about Xiaomi, "Xiaomi is a company that provides internet and software services more than being a hardware company."
And Get Published In Brand Saga