Ringing the smart bell for success in India

Recently, my teenage son back home in India asked if I could treat him to a Xiaomi Mi4i smartphone, or what he called "the ultimate style statement".

Many Chinese brands have truly gone global, so much so that some are already household names, even in India. For many years, the country's smartphone market has been dominated by the likes of Nokia Nokia Oyj and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd.

But today companies such as Xiaomi Inc, Gionee Communication Equipment Co Ltd, Oneplus Co Ltd, Oppo Electronics Corp, Lenovo Group Ltd, Huawei Technologies Co Ltd and ASUSTeK Computer Inc are reported to be scrapping hard for business.