Transsion investing in handset plant

Chinese mobile phone manufacturer Transsion Holdings will start running its handset assembly plant in Gazipur by June while the commercial launch of its devices is expected in July.

The plant has already been set up and the company is moving ahead with its plans to invest, which is coming into the country as foreign direct investment, said Rezwanul Haque, chief executive officer of Transsion Bangladesh, yesterday.

Transsion Holdings rolled out its products in Bangladesh in July last year and has already grabbed about 15 percent of the market share. The company aims to market its locally-assembled smart and feature phones and 90 percent of its preparations have already been completed. It also plans to export smart devices within next two years.

 “Our first target is to cater the local market and then we will plan about the export market,” said Haque, also the immediate past general secretary of the Bangladesh Mobile Phone Importers Association. Currently, the company has two brands: itel for the feature phone segment and Techno for the smart-phone segment.

“After getting the certification from the telecom regulator and the National Board of Revenue, we will start assembling and go for the commercial launch,” Haque said during the launch of its two flagship smart-phones at the Westin Dhaka hotel. The CAMON X and CAMON X Pro specialise in photography and are priced Tk 17,990 and Tk 22,990 respectively.

“We have run our local research in the Bangladesh market and used the findings to manufacture the two handsets in China. We hope to produce these kinds of products in our local factory within a short time,” said Haque.

Transsion's assembly plant will look to pull together 5 lakh units per month with its 1,000-strong workforce.

At present, the firm is marketing products in 58 countries and has two factories in China and one each in India, Nigeria, and Ethiopia.

The government slashed customs duty by 36 percentage points to 1 percent in the last budget for components meant for assembling handsets, piquing the interest of many local and global players.

In 2017, Bangladesh imported 3.34 crore handsets worth Tk 10,000 crore.