The outbreak of Covid-19 has had some major impact on a lot of aspects of everyone’s lives and consumer behaviour is one key area to look at.
With everything shut down or gradually opening, reliance on online shopping naturally increased.
A new report by Counterpoint Research has claimed that India has captured the highest share in terms of online sales of the global mobile phone market in 2020.
The country stood at 45% market share, followed by the UK at 39% and China at 34%.
Both India and US recorded their respective highest ever online share in the second half of 2020.
Overall, online sales accounted for about 26% share of the global mobile phone market in 2020, which means that one in four mobile phones sold was purchased online.
The growth of online handset sales and its share was found to be strong in developed regions such as the US and Europe as well as emerging markets such as India and Latin America.
Despite the on-going impact of Covid-19, the report predicts that this growth of online smartphone shopping will slow down for some time.
It claimed that this year will be similar to the previous year or slightly lower.
Analyst Sujeong Lim said, “After the rapid growth in 2020, we expect 2021 to see some easing after the COVID-19 vaccination.
However, it is expected to grow slightly every year from 2022 onwards, supported by growth in emerging markets and the middle-aged population becoming more accustomed to IT devices and internet use.” Lim added, “But in the case of India, which currently has the highest online proportion, it may decrease to a certain level after 2022 due to the development of offline infrastructure such as multi-brand stores and large-scale retail stores.
On the other hand, the future growth of the online market in South East Asia and Middle East and Africa is noteworthy.”