The mobile broadband users' growth in Pakistan is expected to touch 8 per cent mark in coming years as the country would have more than 40 million smartphones by end of this year. The third-generation (3G) and 4G mobile phone users stand at around 30 million and continue to grow, creating a huge demand for smartphones, which is the top selling category across all major e-commerce platforms.
Publicly available data shows mobile phone imports in terms of value and not in units, making it difficult to figure out category-wise imports. However, market sources say less than 20% of Pakistan's monthly mobile phone imports comprise smartphones. This equation though is likely to change in a couple of years, they added. It merits mentioned that Pakistan's e-commerce market is still in its infancy and represents only 5% of conventional retail trade. However, the overall size of this fast growing segment has come close to $100 million, up by two-thirds from $60 million as of 2014.
A bulk of the country's e-commerce transactions originate from Karachi, Lahore, Islamabad and Rawalpindi, which comprise about 50% of customers. The remaining customer base is very thinly split between cities and towns nation-wide. For the future, the markets which will drive the most success are again likely going to be developing ones, namely Emerging Asia at eight percent, and Central & Eastern Europe with a growth rate of 10 percent.
The world's largest market, China, grew by 15 percent this year, the highest growth rate in any region, accounting for a third of all phones sold. However, this streak may be about to end, with operator subsidies set to end next year, which may result in a 3-percent decline in sales. Other markets such as Middle East & Africa, Central and Eastern Europe (Russia and Ukraine) and Emerging Asia managed decent growth levels too. In the Western world, the phone sales remained largely the same, though, as they did in Developed Asia (Hong Kong and Japan) while Latin America shrunk by 4 percent.
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