Micromax forays Russian handset market

India-based company, Micromax forays into Russia. The company aims to have an aggressive plan to make its mark in the Russian mobile handset market re-emphasizing on its vision to offer innovative products and service offerings, which are customized to address the needs of consumers in Russia.

Micromax plans to operate through a partnership with VVP Group, distribution house in Russia. The partnership is a strategic move, which would provide good reach for Micromax in the region with a plan to make Micromax products available across the country, ensuring deeper shelf space and wider outlet spread.

Micromax will be introducing its popular Canvas series of smartphones and Bolt series of smart-feature phones which have been a trendsetter, which have already sold more than 35 million devices across the operating markets for Micromax in the past one year. The company will be launching 14 products in the Russian market in the initial phase, as the brand is already looking at gearing up to be among the Top 4 brands in Russia by the end of 2014. The company is ready with its service infrastructure across Russia with an aim of having more than 60 operational service centers by end of the month. Micromax will also have its exclusive service centers in strategic cities in Russia as the brand strengthens its presence across the country.

Rahul Sharma, Co-Founder, Micromax said, "At Micromax, our emphasis has always been to democratize technology for masses around the world through an innovative product portfolio. As we look to take Micromax to key international markets, we are excited to announce our foray into the Russian mobile handset market which has immense potential not only for smartphones and features phones, but also for innovative tablets and data products. Our initial focus in the Russian market is to replicate the success witnessed in our other markets in the last couple of years. We have carved the vision for ourselves to be the 1st Indian hardware brand to be global and set our footprint with Russia as the first developed market to venture into."

He further added, "We see a growing trend of data consumption through mobile devices in Russia, and we would be initiating partnerships with the leading operators in the region to aim at efficient data consumption on our devices in the coming year".

Vasily Sibirtsev, Chairman VVP Group said, "We are very excited to work with Micromax, one of the world's leading mobile phone brands. Russia is an ideal market for Micromax to bring its innovative product portfolio and services customized for consumers in this market. Our immediate goal will be to build a very strong and robust distribution network to capture a significant share in the Russian mobile handset market. We will be working aggressively to strengthen our presence in the retail space across 9000+ sales points in the country backed by an efficient service infrastructure."

Amit Mathur, Vice President, International Business - Micromax said, " We believe Micromax products to a promising future in Russia where the smart phone market is booming along with data services. Micromax has studied this market and will continuously introduce products and applications with consumer insights from the Russia to bring forth world-class products to this market. We are happy to have found VVP as our strategic business partner to enter the retail market and will strive to maximize our retail strength going forward."