The popularity of smartphones is growing every day and even in emerging markets people are getting a low-cost smartphone instead of feature phone. In fact, there is a growing number of places where smartphones outsell feature phones.
According to ABI Research, the smartphone market is divided in three price tiers – low, mid and high. Shipments of sub-$250 low-cost smartphones will grow from 259 million in 2013 to 788 million in 2018, while mid (sub-$400) and high ($400+) cost smartphone shipments are expected to grow from 635 million to 925 million over the same period.
As you would imagine, users in the emerging economies are driving the growth of low-end smartphones though even in developed markets, carriers are pushing these devices as they help them achieve higher ARPUs.
On the other hand, mid- and high-cost smartphones will continue to play an important role for operators looking to seed their customer base with the most advanced smartphones…
And if you need additional details, you can get them from ABI’s Mobile Handset Markets Database.