KOLKATA: Samsung India crossed the Rs 50,000-crore sales milestone in 2016-17 as per the just published company filings with the Registrar of Companies (RoC), consolidating its position as the country’s largest pure-play consumer goods MNC.The Korean giant’s total income, including turnover and other income, grew by 15.5% to Rs 55,511.9 crore in FY 2017 from Rs 48,053 crore in the previous year despite the Chinese companies making serious inroads into the Indian smartphone market.In fact, Samsung’s mobile business in 2016-17 was higher than the combined sales of the top Chinese and Indian smartphone makers together, including Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, Micromax and Intex in the year under review. It was almost three times that of Apple India.Samsung’s smartphone business grew sales by 26.7% to Rs 34,261 crore, while the home appliance business grew by 12% to Rs 6,395.6 crore. The company’s television business remained stagnant at Rs 4,481.2 crore even though Samsung retained market leadership.
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The company’s net profit, however, grew at a faster pace of 38% to Rs 4,156.2 crore (Rs 3,010.4 crore) which industry analysts attributed to more focus on premium models across smartphones and consumer electronics which have higher margins.Samsung, in its filings, said the ‘Make for India’ initiative, through which most of the products were designed and developed with the Indian consumer’s needs in mind, has been a huge success and a big factor behind the growth.All the businesses at Samsung India improved their gross profitability with the television business more than doubling it and home appliance business almost trebling it. The mobile phone business was the largest contributor to gross profit having grown by 44% in FY17 at Rs 5,005.9 crore.A Samsung India spokesperson said calendar year 2017 was a record year in terms of sales, both mobile and consumer electronics, on the backdrop of robust growth in 2016-17. “We continue to see strong growth for our businesses and expect to cross $10 billion in revenues this year in India,” he said.