Canalys: Smartphone market in Africa grows 12% in Q3 2023

Canalys posted its quarterly analysis of the smartphone market in Africa, and it looks promising compared with other regions across the globe. Between July and September 2023, the continent saw 17.9 million total smartphone shipments, which is 12% more than the same period last year.

Transsion, the company behind Tecno, Infinix, and iTel brands, remained an undisputed leader with a 48% market share, almost twice as much as the second-placed Samsung.

The region demonstrated strong resilience in demand and supply, in contrast with the macroeconomic challenges makers are facing elsewhere. South Africa, for example, saw a growth of 20% despite rapid currency devaluation.

Customers wanted mid-tier devices with big screens and batteries to keep them entertained during power outages, said Canalys Senior Consultant Manish Pravinkumar. Nigeria and Egypt also saw an increase in sales of entry-level smartphones, where Xiaomi prioritized sales of Redmi Note 12 4G, Redmi 12, and Redmi 12C variants.

Egypt, for example, was facing a hard currency shortage to pay for its imported goods, including smartphones, following the war in Ukraine and the exit of indirect investment. Now, the import curbs have been cleared, and the country saw an increase of 19% in smartphone growth.

While Transsion, Xiaomi, and Realme all worked on pushing their affordable devices, Samsung took it in another direction. The company maintained sales of its Galaxy A series to keep volume going but decided to promote the foldable devices in order to position itself in a favorable position in the premium segment - which is not that popular in Africa.

Canalys revealed Huawei’s strategy in the region was to work with local software suppliers. That way, it can enhance the usability of the Huawei Mobile Services, tackling the lack of GMS on its Android devices.

The growth in Africa is not a one-time wonder, Canalys revealed. However, demand is expected to slow down, and growth in 2024 will be limited to a single-digit percentage.

Countries across the whole continent are adopting more and more smartphones. However, there are still hurdles, such as currency devaluation, import taxes, and government initiatives to promote local products, leading to cost and price hikes of imported goods, such as smartphones.

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