Huawei takes on Apple, Samsung with cheap tablet computer
A lady uses a Huawei tablet in Nairobi, May 17, 2011. Huawei Technologies has unveiled another tablet — a portable mini-computer with a touch screen —into Kenya as it seeks a foothold in a market dominated by Samsung and Apple.
China’s Huawei Technologies has unveiled another tablet — a portable mini-computer with a touch screen —into Kenya as it seeks a foothold in a market dominated by Samsung and Apple.
The 7-inch Android-based tablet is a higher version of a similar product it launched in the Kenyan market in February highlighting the growing quest by the Chinese technology giant to seek a larger piece of Kenya’s market.
Presently, the lucrative but small tablet market is dominated by Apple and Samsung through the products iPad and Galaxy, but Huawei is betting on its low-price business model to gain market share.
“Our goal is for more Kenyans to continue enjoying better Android experience on affordable high-end devices,” said Herman He, the CEO of Huawei Kenya.
The higher version of the 7-inch Huawei tablet will retail at Sh39, 999—a signal that it’s keen to wage a price against Samsung and Apple.
Apple‘s iPad is currently retailing at Sh85, 000 while Samsung’s Galaxy goes at Sh60,000, and these products are becoming popular with Kenya’s middle class and executives.
A tablet is a complete mobile computer, which is larger than a mobile phone and operated by touching the screen. It often uses an on-screen virtual keyboard or a digital pen rather than a physical keyboard and it can be used to access and store digital content such as electronic bible, educational materials, to send and check emails, play computer games and watching movies among others.
They are much portable compared to laptops and due to their large screens can be used to perform more tasks than mobile phones.
The Huawei launch comes in the heels of the introduction on Monday of a similar product by South Africa’s computer vendor, Mustek, setting the stage for a vicious battle for control of this segment of the market.
For Huawei, which is using Safaricom retail network for a piece of the market, its quest for the tablet comes at a time when it seeking the entire breadth of Kenya’s technology market including cellphones, smartphones and network infrastructure.
In the mobile market, it’s targeting the low end of the market using its cellphone and the mid and highend market using smartphones dubbed IDEOS—which grabbed market due to low price and promotion of by mobile telephony firms.
Presently, 98 per cent of Kenya’s internet users access the service on mobile devices such as cellphones, according to the Communication Commission of Kenya (CCK)
On the infrastructure arena, Huawei along with its Chinese rival ZTE have won major tenders for the mega infrastructure businesses in Kenya as local mobile telephony firms announce ambitious upgrade plans with a focus on the 3G and 4G network.
Huawei inked a Sh12 billion deal with Safaricom for the rollout of the firm’s 4G core network while ZTE is working on Telkom Kenya’s upgrade with a Sh4 billion pricetag.
The growing interest of the Chinese firms in Kenya’s telecom sector has ushered in a high-stake battle for the contracts that has pitted diplomats from Western and China angling for their firms to clinch the deals.
European firms such as Ericsson, Alcatel-Lucent and Nokia have previously maintained a stronghold over Kenya’s telecom market.
Huawei aims to ship one million tablet PCs this year after selling more than 200,000 units since launching its tablet PCs late last year, and will use Kenya as a launch-pad to the Eastern and central Africa markets.
Analysts reckon it has an uphill task in the burgeoning tablet market where iPad command an 80 percent share.
