Honor opts for offline route to strengthen presence in India

New Delhi, June 4: Honor, the e-only smartphones brand under Chinese telecom equipment company Huawei, on Thursday announced it was taking the offline route to strengthen its presence in India. As part of the new strategy, Honor has partnered with Sangeetha, arguably one of the largest mobile phone retailing chains in south India. “The deal reiterates the importance of India as its priority market for Honor and is expected to catalyse Honor’s goal of clocking 10x sales in 2015,” the company said. Honor’s Holly smartphones will be available offline at a price of Rs.7,999 while the company keeps selling its other products online via Flipkart.

The announcement asssumes significance as Honor seems to have broken the trend of Chinese brands that are only selling their smartphones online.

Commenting on the new strategy, Allen Wang, president of consumer business group, Huawei India said: “To reinforce our commitment towards our customers in India we have decided to introduce Honor Holly in brick-and-mortar retailer shops where customers can get a hands-on experience of our smartphone.

“We are glad to exclusively partner with Sangeetha mobiles as they have a strong presence in the southern market in India.” Sangeetha has a network of 320 stores present across four states — Kartaka, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil du and Kerela — with 60 percent of the stores present in Bangalore.

“Holly will be available at an iugural offer of 20 percent cashback, also allowing customers to get a brand new reliance dongle along with the phone at an additiol Re.1,” the company said. (IANS)