The rumors are true: the soft drinks brand is making a brave play for launching a set of mobile phones and accessories in China, but will it work? Every FMCG brand is looking for leverage in mobile channels, but until now few have braved entering the device war themselves. Pepsi is working with a licensing […]
The rumors are true: the soft drinks brand is making a brave play for launching a set of mobile phones and accessories in China, but will it work?
Every FMCG brand is looking for leverage in mobile channels, but until now few have braved entering the device war themselves.
Pepsi is working with a licensing partner to market a line of mobile phones and accessories in China in the next few months.
However, the FMCG giant has no plans to get into the mobile phone manufacturing business, a PepsiCo spokeswoman has confirmed.
Technology website Mobipicker was the first to report, on Oct. 11, that PepsiCo would release a smartphone, called Pepsi P1, with “decent but not high-end specs” later on October.
This week, the Daily Mail ran a series of leaked specs and images for the Android handset — titled for now as the Pepsi P1 — prompting the admission to the paper.
Pepsi said a “line of mobile phones and accessories” will bow in China within just a few months, and despite no formal plans to enter the smartphone market.
Pepsi told the Daily Mail that it will launch in China in a way akin to previous forays into the country that focused on apparel and accessories.
Pepsi, with its focus on youth culture, wants to reach China’s mobile-addicted under-25 set. A Millward Brown study last year found that Chinese people spent 170 minutes a day on their smartphones, double the time they spend watching TV.
