China’s Oppo builds on smartphone success at home with Southeast Asia push

Chinese smartphone maker Oppo may currently dominate China’s smartphone market with almost one-fifth market share, edging out previous leader Huawei, but the company is already looking to expand even more aggressively into markets such as Vietnam, Indonesia and India.

Four years ago, Oppo was competing with a sea of rivals, struggling against smartphone giants like Samsung and Apple to gain a slice of the Chinese market. In the third quarter of 2016, the company shipped more than 20 million devices in China, growing over 105 per cent compared to the previous year.

Just two years after entering the Southeast Asian market, data from market research firms IDC and GFK show that the Chinese smartphone brand has taken the No. 2 spot in both Indonesia and Vietnam.

“We’re in more than 20 countries and regions, but we are focused on Southeast Asia,” Oppo vice president Alen Wu told the Post in an interview. To market its brand overseas, Dongguan-headquartered Oppo has sponsored variety shows such as X Factor in Indonesia and even cricket tournaments in India, an emerging market for the company.

Across Southeast Asia, Oppo is playing up its offline-focused strategy. The company currently has about 300 retail points and experience stores that it manages directly, on top of many more third-party retailers that stock the popular phone brand.

Like its strategy in China, Oppo co-operates directly with retailers to provide both training and salespeople to help them sell smartphones. The salespeople help bring in business for the retailers, allowing shops to sell Oppo devices without much effort.