One popular smartphone brand continues to elude South Africa.
Eleven generations into its Pixel series, Google has still not launched its smartphones in South Africa, even as it offers them in several countries with populations around 10% of ours.
Google recently unveiled its Pixel 11 range, featuring a faster Tensor G6 chip, upgraded cameras with more light sensitivity on zoom lenses, faster wireless charging, and brighter displays.
The company roped in one of South Africa’s most well-known celebrities, Trevor Noah, to host the event.
The former host of The Daily Show has become a globally known figure and primarily spends his time in the United States.
Noah joked that Google only invited him to present at the event because it got sick of his constant comments on its product launch videos.
Many South Africans would have preferred that he point out the continued lack of Pixel availability in his home country.
The smartphones are popular for offering a bloat-free Android experience without any pre-installed third-party software or modifications from third-party manufacturers.
The Android operating system on Pixel devices uses all of Google’s apps for features like email, media, events, and cloud storage out of the box.
Many of these apps are also the ones people use on their computers, making for fuss-free syncing across devices.
As Google’s flagship phone, the Pixel is a popular choice for delivering the ecosystem convenience that Apple users enjoy across iPhone and Mac devices.
Google also generally rolls out new Android features first to Pixel smartphones. They also receive certain exclusive features, particularly artificial intelligence-powered capabilities.
The Pixel a-series also brings a strong value proposition to the market, offering the same Tensor chip and core camera capabilities as its standard models at a mid-range price.
With each new Pixel release, Google has gradually expanded the markets in which it sells these devices, but South Africa has not made the cut in over a decade.
Several countries with much smaller addressable smartphone markets have received Google’s devices, including Singapore, Denmark, Finland, and Norway, all with populations around 10% of South Africa’s.
Trevor Noah presenting the Google Pixel 11 announcement
However, market size was unlikely to be the deciding factor in those rollouts. Firstly, the average revenue per user of smartphone customers in those countries is higher than in South Africa.
The vast majority of smartphone sales in South Africa are prepaid in the budget segment. Smaller, high-income nations buy significantly more flagship phones, often with higher profit margins.
That makes these markets more profitable for Google, which does not compete directly in the entry-level budget market, at least not in hardware.
In addition, extending Pixel availability from large to small European countries carries very little incremental cost for Google, especially compared to a rollout on an entirely new continent.
A single regulatory filing, standard consumer protection laws, and an existing central European warehouse network allow Google to supply small EU nations without setting up new local infrastructure.
In South Africa, it would have to obtain ICASA approval and potentially compliance certifications from the National Regulator for Compulsory Specifications for its chargers.
Lastly, smaller high-income markets generally still subsidise phone hardware upfront, guaranteeing more predictable sales than in prepaid-heavy markets.
In recent feedback to MyBroadband, Telkom said that this type of subsidisation no longer happens in the South African market.
That is primarily because the revenue they would previously have delivered over time, primarily from voice services, has declined.
Even though Google does not officially sell or support its Pixel devices in South Africa, people can import its smartphones, wearables, and other tech and use them locally.
However, there are some technical drawbacks and limitations to be aware of before venturing on this route.
Certain features, such as 5G, voice-over-LTE, and voice-over-Wi-Fi, require smartphone manufacturers to work with local mobile networks to test and certify their firmware.
This process costs money and resources, and is another factor to consider for smartphone makers planning to expand into new markets.
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