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HTC gets it right - scores a slim profit

Cape Town - Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer HTC has announced a slim profit thanks to healthy growth.

The company announced a 25% increase in revenue that saw quarterly revenue hit NT$41.5bn ($1.36bn).

"We have continued to raise our game over the last few months, and the Q1 results reflect the hard work we have put in to consolidating our processes and operations, while enhancing our core focus of superlative design and technology for the mobile lifestyle," said Cher Wang, HTC CEO.

After tax, the company reported a slim profit of NT$0.36bn or around $11m.

HTC attributed the success to targeted marketing of its new One (M9) smartphone as well the expansion of its footprint in emerging markets.

The company has been hard at work trying to catch up with Asian competitors such as Samsung, Huawei, LG and Lenovo in a smartphone market share race.

Price

However, despite receiving numerous accolades for the One in 2013, including the GSMA's Best Handset Device or Tablet award, sales were harder to come by and the company suffered a loss of NT$1.32bn ($43m).

While HTC is relieved to be in the black, the numbers pale in comparison with Samsung which announced a 39% drop in profit to 4.63 trillion won ($4.35bn).

HTC has launched the One (M9) in SA and it is expected to be on the shelves by June.

Price, however, will be critical as data from the IDC indicates.

According to the industry tracker, phones priced between $100 and $200 had the largest growth surge - from 25% to 33% market share in the Middle East and Africa.

The previous generation One had an initial retail price of over 12 000 on launch, hurting potential sales.

The demand for lower cost phones in emerging markets has been beneficial for companies such as Huawei, Lenovo and Hisense.

- Follow Duncan on Twitter

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