New Delhi: India shipped 13.9 million wearable devices including watches, wristbands and ear-wear in the first quarter of year-on-year (YoY) 2022, the International Data Corporation (IDC) reported on May 16. Watches were the fastest growing category, with a growth of 173% annually. IDC attributes this growth to “new launches, discounts across channels and aggressive marketing by brands”.
The drop in the ASP of watches led to a 17.1% drop in the average selling price (ASP) of wearables, falling 41.5% to $50.3 in the first quarter from $86 a year ago.
Upasana Joshi, Research Manager, IDC India, believes that the production linked incentive (PLI) scheme for wearables could lead to further decline in ASPs. Mint reported last December that several Indian brands, including boAt and Noise, had started making wearables in India through contract partners.
He said, “With the PLI scheme for wearables announced by the government, major players in the ecosystem have started entering into local manufacturing of these devices and launched ‘Made in India’ products, potentially leading to more innovations in ASP. has decreased.”
The basic real-time operating system (RTOS) of watches like boAt and Noise can run limited apps and accounts for 95.1% of shipments under the watches category at a rate of 202.1%. Meanwhile, shipments of smartwatches, which include products such as Apple and Samsung, declined 4.2% year-on-year, according to IDC.
Wristband shipments continued to decline for the ninth quarter in a row, as more buyers are turning to watches for more features and bigger screens. Combined shipments of watches and wristbands were 4 million units in the first quarter.
Although watches were the fastest-growing category, earwear accounted for 71.3% of all wearables shipments in the quarter. The growth rate of earwear was only 4.2%. Within earwear, truly wireless stereo (TWS) that can be plugged into the ear grew 48.2%, while its market share increased from 48.3% to 34.2% during the quarter.
Anisha Dumbrey, Senior Market Analyst, Client Devices, IDC India said, “Intense competition in the under $50 category is driving all brands to offer competitive offerings in terms of pricing, features and device design.
Dumbrey said reliance on devices such as TWS and wearable watches is increasing, although “supply remains a concern for the industry,” she said.
In terms of brand share in total shipments of wearables, New Delhi-based Imagine Marketing, which sells its earwear and watches under the BoAt brand, ended the quarter as the market leader with a 22.9% share, up from 5.2% Growing at the rate of YoY.
Gurugram-based Nexxbase, which sells products under the Noise brand, grew at 150.1% year-on-year and was the second leading brand in wearables with a market share of 10.9%.
Chinese brand OnePlus stood third with 7.4% market share as its shipments declined by 35.8%.
Fire-Bolt and Realme took the fourth and fifth positions in wearables, with 6.6% market share for both.
Mumbai-based Fire- Bolt was the fastest growing brand among wearables as its shipments grew by 1522.2% y-o-y during the quarter.
According to IDC, the growth in wearables is attracting new players to the market. Joshi believes that the wearables market will continue to witness strong growth during the second quarter as well as the second half.
“Aggressive offers, sales and marketing around the festive season in 2H 2022 are expected to continue the growth momentum for the wearable device categories this year,” she said.