It seems Nigerians, like most Americans, are missing out on an interesting revolution happening out there in the smart phone universe. But then, if you stood on a rail track with your Beats headphones on and oblivious of the rushing train, does it make you safer? Or maybe an ostrich, with its head planted in the sand and nice rump in the air, wouldn’t know that it’s about to get bitch slapped.
That was a digression. It seems I can’t keep a conversation without drawing a wonky line.
I remember vividly how Blackberry sneaked on Nokia and ate its breakfast. Then Android + Samsung ate Blackberry’s lunch. Seems Samsung is going to be hungry tonight because two bad ass boys are around the corner, but the demolition promised would upend everything.
Quite a number of smart phone makers are all over the world with most around the middle kingdom but the cachet that Samsung and Apple have over everyone has been selling high-end phones: powerful chipsets, stunning graphics and expensive clothing. Of course, the price of this phone can buy about a third of a Tata Nano.
Here comes in Xiaomi. A recent entrant into the smart phone arena and in a few months have rocketed to number 3, sniffing annoyingly at Samsung backside. It’s on track to sell 100M smart phones in 2015. What’s the trick? High-end phones at knockoff prices. What’s their game? They want to take over the world, that is, do bloodletting with Samsung then come back and earn some money.
You wonder if a business can survive without earning a decent profit? Yes. Amazon!
So far it seems to be working and investors are pouring in more cash than Hurricane Katrina.
This would have been perfectly OK if another Chinese ain’t doing same. OnePlus is just a year old as a company and wants to push out about 5 million phones this year at cutthroat prices but with hope to make money on services.
Of course, the gloomy pictures I just painted is for the like of Samsung to brood over. As far as consumers are concerned, they could slug each other to death.
By the way, when are we getting a mobile phone with 8GB RAM and 48 hours battery?