108-Megapixel Mi Note 10 Budget Smartphone Launching in Japan
Xiaomi Corp. is entering Japan taking on Apple with the budget-friendly Mi Note 10 smartphone and the Mi Smart Band 4 fitness tracker.
The Chinese company is making the Mi Note 10 Android smartphone available in Japan for immediate pre-order to be shipped on Dec. 16. Priced from 52,800 yen ($486), the handset has a high-resolution 108-megapixel camera, a 5,260mAh battery rated to last longer than two days and a 6.5-inch OLED display with curved edges.
Alongside the Mi Note, Xiaomi also introduced its Mi Smart Band 4 wearable for 3,490 yen, a portable battery pack for 1,899 yen, an induction-heating rice cooker for 9,999 yen and a premium all-metal suitcase for 17,900 yen, all aggressively priced for the Japanese market.
Xiomi, the world's fourth largest smartphone maker, is looking for new markets to recover its smartphone shipment growth, after losing its market share in China from rival Huawei Technologies Co. Xiaomi’s China shipments took a 30% dive last quarter, while hardware sales in India and Europe grew.
Entering the Japanese market won't be easy, as the already shrinking smartphone market is dominated by Apple and domestic brands like Sharp and Fujitsu.
Apple shipped about 45% of all the smartphones in Japan in the fiscal first half to Sept. 30, according to a report by MM Research Institute Ltd. Sharp, Samsung Electronics Co. and Sony Corp. followed, none of which exceeded 13%. Huawei, which ranked fifth last fiscal year, didn’t make the top 5 after carriers earlier this year dropped its models from their lineups amid China-U.S. trade tensions.
Xiaomi company plans to introduce at least 10 5G-enabled smartphone models next year as state-backed carriers in China spend billions of dollars constructing networks.