How Xiaomi Won Big in Franchise 100

Xiaomi has made it to the Franchise 100 list 2020 recently published by The Franchising World magazine. The brand won big accolades in the annual list of Top-100 franchise brands in India, which are assessed on over 45 parameters to identify the high growth and franchise-friendly opportunities across the sectors.

Besides making it to the Franchise 100, the premier technology and lifestyle brand secured strong position among the Top-10 brands across all the parameters; it also ranked among the Top-5 brands, which recorded the highest franchise outlet growth over the last three years (2017-19). In addition, Xiaomi marked its presence among the Top-5 brands with highest average franchise outlet growth since establishment and the Top-5 brands with highest employee growth (2017-2019).

With its vision to provide ‘innovation to all,’ Xiaomi has posted a whopping 49,900% growth in its franchise outlets over the last three years. The brand grew exponentially from just five franchise outlets in 2017 to over 2,500 outlets (Mi Store) in 2019. In addition, the company has 75+ Mi Homes as well as a wide presence through over 5,000 Mi ‘preferred partners’ and all the LFRs. Overall, Xiaomi has presence in over 790 cities in India. Further, it has over 2,000 authorised service centres across the country.

In fact, Xiaomi scored impressively across the parameters to be upgraded to the ‘Established’ players category in the Franchise 100 list 2020 from the ‘Emerging’ brands category in the previous list.

The brand attributes this massive offline growth to its focus on upcountry markets with its Mi Stores. “We realised that the expectations of people living in rural towns are not so different from their metro counterparts. The only change being that no other brand had attempted to reach them before,” says Manu Jain, Managing Director, Xiaomi India. The company has expanded presence across over 300 Tier III cities and beyond with its small-format Mi Stores.

Jain highlights that Xiaomi’s distinct strategies also enabled such an impressive turnaround over the last 3-4 years. These included garnering ‘Mi fans,’ mostly techies, to speak for the brand, and then team leads under the age of 30 years, most without any prior experience in a smartphone company.

Having sold over 100 million smartphones since its debut in India, Xiaomi has now been India’s top smartphone seller for eight consecutive quarters with 28.3% market share in Q2 2019, as per IDC. It is also the No. 1 smart TV brand in India with 33% share. It now plans to launch its range of laptops in India in 2020.

Franchise 100

The Franchising World, India’s no.1 franchising magazine, identifies the TOP-100 franchise brands and celebrates their achievements every year in its anniversary issue. The issue highlights the established and emerging Indian and global brands that are increasing their positioning in India along with the new-age brands that are lucrative and profitable, expanding fast and can act as a reference guide for budding entrepreneurs and investors across India.

Franchise 100 is the one-stop destination to know everything about the franchise industry and the leading brands, which investors and prospective franchisees can consider to start their entrepreneurship journey.