Price war at Mobile Expo keeps consumers smiling

It's a buyer's market at Thailand Mobile Expo 2016 as a price war and special promotions are slashing prices of popular smartphones.

Please join us on our Facebook page http://www.facebook.com/bangkokpostlearning

Price war rages at stock clearance mobile expo

Suchit Leesa-nguansuk   

Consumers are taking advantage of massive discounts at a stock clearance of best-selling smartphones at Thailand Mobile Expo 2016, a four-day event aimed at bolstering local sales of smartphones this year.

Mobile phone manufacturers and operators are clearing their existing inventories as they await the arrival of the Apple iPhone 7, which is scheduled to be available in stores in Thailand on Oct 21.

Advanced Info Service (AIS) is offering customers a chance to buy the iPhone 6 S at subsidised prices for the first time, with a discount of up to 9,000 baht, in exchange for signing up with AIS's mobile service.

The country's largest mobile operator also cut the price of the Samsung Galaxy Note 5 by more than 30%, and is offering a reduction of almost 30% on the Huawei P9.

In a head-to-head competition, second-ranked operator Total Access Communication is boasting its lowest-ever price reduction on the iPhone 6S with a 50% discount.

Visitors to Thailand Mobile Expo are also being bombarded with promotional and marketing offers by handset manufacturers such as Sony, Motorola and Huawei, striving to increase sales.

"This quarter's event is really about a price war," said Opas Cherdpunt, managing director of M Vision, the organiser of Thailand Mobile Expo.

With competition so fierce, consumers have many choices.

The expo, which started Thursday and runs until Sunday, is being held at Queen Sirikit National Convention Center.

Mr Opas said the price war is needed to stimulate the domestic smartphone market as the sluggish economy has hurt sales of smartphones.

"We expect to maintain sales at 1.5 billion baht, equal to the previous event's sales, thanks to heavy price competition," he said. Visitor numbers are expected to be 10% higher than the previous event.

Narathip Wirunechatapant, vice-president of SET-listed handset distributor Jaymart, said the price war should be a boon for the replacement market, the prime growth driver of the local smartphone market in the final quarter.

He acknowledged that Thailand's smartphone market has reached saturation point, the same level as certain developed countries.

Nutchanon Boonsorn, an analyst at global research firm IDC, said sales of smartphones in Thailand are projected to grow by only 6% to 23 million units this year, compared with the double-digit growth over the past few years.

Samsung announced the start of a pre-order campaign for the new Galaxy Note 7 in Thailand by November.

Also Thursday, Samsung launched Samsung Pay, a mobile payment system that can be used to make purchases almost anywhere credit cards are accepted.

สามารถฝึกอ่านออกเสียงและดูคำแปลได้ที่ : http://www.bangkokpost.com/learning/learning-from-news/1098992/price-war-at-mobile-expo-keeps-consumers-smiling