NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Thursday, March 24, 2016

Sales of affordable smartphones with in-built camera and internet-enabled features are set to shoot up to 160 million in 2016-17 from 100 million in 2015-16, an Assocham study said on Wednesday.

Consequent to smartphones serving the needs of amateur photographers and enthusiasts, the rise of such phones is eating into the demand for digital cameras which witnessed a drop in sales by more than 35 percent in the last one year, the study said.

“Technology is changing at such a fast pace that product developers have to think ahead of times, or else the top selling products of the present times can become outdated, without the manufacturers and those dominating the market today realising it,” said Assocham secretary D.S. Rawat.

“There has been a subsequent rise in the demand of smartphones in the country in the last one year and one of the reasons behind this growing importance is largely due to the increase in social networking site.