As ecommerce major Flipkart diversifies into various businesses, it is set to launch a new smartphone under its brand Billion. The smartphone – claimed to be made for India – will be called Billion Capture+ and will go on sale on the ecommerce website from November 15, as per media reports.
As per a Times of India report, the Billion Capture+ is aimed at the mid-segment smartphone segment. It will be priced around Rs 11,000-13,000 and will be manufactured by Smartrone, an Indian device maker. Interestingly, this is the most competitive segment for smartphones in India.
A Mint report quotes Hrishikesh Thite, head of the Billion category says that the smartphone will come in two variants 32GB and 64GB.
“This is a very significant event for us, given that a hi-tech product like a smartphone takes our brand to another level. What we have done better from our side is that we’ve tried to understand consumer needs better, we’ve tried to understand what are the features in a smartphone that they would like to see more of and what are the kind of features that they don’t use much. And that’s something that we’ve used to over-index on those features that they need more in a smartphone, and we’ve taken away those features that they don’t value as much,” Min quotes Bansal as saying.
Flipkart, which claims to be the market leader in the smartphone category has several exclusive and non-exclusive partnerships with brands such as Xiaomi, Samsung, Vivo and Oppo. All these brands make smartphones that would directly compete with Billion Capture+.
However, with Flipkart launching its own brand, other smartphone players could possibly withdraw selling their smartphones from the platform, thus affecting the sales of the ecommerce major. However, this, at the moment, is only a possibility, which Sachin has dismissed.
Launched in July, Flipkart’s private label ‘Billion’ is the brainchild of CEO Sachin Bansal. Flipkart has already launched a few products under the kitchen appliances and lifestyle products categories.
TOI reports that the brand was born after Flipkart's research found that there was a high level of dissatisfaction that existed among consumers despite a range of various products being already present in the market.
Sachin Bansal told Mint that Flipkart will launch more products across categories such as large appliances under the Billion brand over the coming months.
The idea behind a private label is the fact that they bring in higher margins for the company as compared to products sold by third-party sellers.
Flipkart has been looking to increase margins on the goods sold on its platform. This could also be the reason behind it re-entering the furniture segment, which is also a high margin category.