India's smartphone market, which recently emerged as the world's second-largest, having overtaken the US, is reaching maturity stage, as the percentage of consumers who are willing to buy smartphones this year declines, said a survey.
In 2015, smartphone sales in the country stood at over 100 million, posting a robust growth of 23 percent compared to a year earlier.
"The smartphone market has reached maturity. The percentage of consumers planning to purchase a smartphone in the next 12 months has dropped from a peak of 80 percent in 2014 to 68 percent," Press Trust of India quoted the survey, conducted by US-based technology giant Accenture, as saying.
The survey said more than 80 percent of the participants already use a smartphone.
Currently, India has over 220 million unique smartphone users, higher than those in the US, according to a report by Counterpoint Research released earlier this month.
Nearly 32 percent of those surveyed by Accenture are not willing to buy smartphones this year due to high price or because of satisfaction over current ones.
Besides, 4 percent of the 1,000 participants in the survey said they are not looking to buy a smartphone this year due to lack of innovative features in the new handsets.
"This seems to indicate that the consumer technology industry has not delivered a 'wow' factor attractive enough to consumers to drive replacement upgrades," the survey said.
The demand for Internet of Things (IoT) devices is growing at a much-slower-than-expected pace due to concerns over privacy and security issues, the survey said.
"In India, about 70 percent of the customers have rated privacy/security concerns as one of the main reasons for not using an IoT (gadgets controlled by Internet) device," the survey said.
