UAE residents average annual spending on electronic items dropped slightly to Dh4,793 on electronic items with a lion’s share, between Dh3,000 and Dh3,500, spent on mobile phones and tablets, according to a bi-annual survey conducted by Al-Futtaim Group’s consumer electronics and IT retailer Plug-Ins.
“The drop in average spending on electronics items is due to price deflation,” said Sean Connor, General Manager of Plug-Ins.
Large amount of consumer spending goes into buying smartphone and tablets, he said adding that Samsung maintains its dominant position in the smartphone segment followed by Apple and BlackBerry.
It was retailer’s third bi-annual survey of UAE consumers to gauge trends of the local consumers. The online survey was based on response from 1,974 respondents of 48 nationalities and conducted over a period of 30 days (August 6, 2014 to September 6, 2014). The survey looked at four key CE categories including Smartphones, TV’s, Laptops and Tablets and Cameras.
“Of the total 1,974 people who participated in the survey, 92 per cent respondents made a major electronics purchase over the last 12 months with smartphones (68.6 per cent) topping their shopping list followed by TVs (36.3 per cent), laptops (35.9 per cent), tablets (34.8 per cent) and camera (23.4 per cent),” Connor told reporters while announcing the survey results in Dubai on Sunday.
According to a survey conducted six months ago in April 2014 by Plug-Ins average spending on electronic items was Dh4,875.
Research firm Business Monitor International said earlier this year that the UAE residents spent $508 million (Dh1.86 billion) in 2013 on new mobile phones. It expects UAE residents’ spending on mobile phones to be more than 36 per cent to $694 million in 2017.
The Plug-Ins survey has been released just before the region’s largest consumer electronics exhibition Gitex Shoppers which will be held from September 27 to October 4, 2014 at the Dubai World Trade Centre.
According to Connor, 76.2 per cent of the survey participants plan to purchase a smartphone in the next 6 months, roughly 10 per cent more compared to the April 2014 survey and 15 per cent higher versus the inaugural survey held a year ago.
Samsung (56.1 per cent) and Apple (41.8 per cent) slightly increased their market share at the expense of Blackberry which saw its slice of the market drop from 25.9 per cent in April 2014 to 20 per cent in September 2014.
Commenting on television demand, Connor said 30-39” panel size leads in terms of current size of TV’s owned with 51.2 per cent of the respondents followed by 34.1 per cent with 40-42”.
Around 38.2 per cent of the respondents said their next panel size would be 40”-42” and a further 33.5 per cent said they would buy the 46”-50” panel size.