Stretching its reservations on imports from India to multinational companies, Pakistan is understood to have informed mobile handset maker Nokia not to sell phones made in India in the Islamic nation.
The reservations of Pakistan in receiving such mobile phones apparently were conveyed to Nokia through authorised cell phone distributors, who have asked the company not to ship Indian made handsets into Pakistan on the ground that consumers may not like it.
The company, which has a facility near Chennai in south India, has accepted the distributors' plea, Dawn reported.
Nokia India started exporting mobile handsets from its plant at Sriperumbudur, 50 km west of Chennai, from the middle of last year. Due to the availability of cheaper raw material in India, there is a possibility that the Indian-made mobile phones may be slightly cheaper compared to cell phones produced by the company in Germany, Hungary and China.
Director United Mobile Ejaz Hassan told Dawn on Wednesday that Nokia had asked the Pakistani distributors over the possibility of making shipments from India two months back. "The three to four authorised distributors of Nokia in Pakistan have offered their regrets to Nokia as they think that consumers will give a cold response to the Indian product," he said, adding that the company has accepted the request.
The government had not allowed the entry of Indian made mobile phone sets in Pakistan and it may not allow the same in future, the newspaper said as Pakistan traded with India through a positive and negative list. And the mobile phones are currently on the negative list.
Currently, the authorised distributors of Nokia open letters of credit (L/Cs) with Nokia Middle East Africa (MEA), Dubai and the mobile phone giant ships the consignment from Finland, Hungary, Germany or China depending on the models that are being manufactured in these countries.
Hassan said that global price of Nokia has been same all over the world. Indian made cell phones might be cheaper in terms of lower transportation cost, cheaper raw materials etc, but Pakistani customers have developed a taste for sets made in Europe and China owing to their quality and reliability.
India is producing only three to four models, he said. Nokia holds 50-55 per cent market share in Pakistan, while Sony Ericsson enjoys 14-15 per cent followed by Samsung 12 per cent and Motorola six to seven per cent.
According to Federal Bureau of Statistics (FBS), mobile phone imports in Pakistan surged by 36 per cent in July-February 2006-07 to $561 million as compared to $413 million in the year-ago period.
He said currently 800,000-900,000 cell phone sets land in the country every month as compared to 400,000-500,000 sets two years back. Total mobile phone users in Pakistan have crossed over 53 million.
