Boston, MA -- (SBWIRE) -- 07/22/2013 -- Rising household incomes offer potential for strong growth in consumer electronics demand as consumers look to get their hands on the latest devices. Flat-screen TVs and smartphones will drive volume sales, with the replacement cycle for mobile handsets comparatively shorter than other segments. Nevertheless, the rising price of smartphones means new devices are bought slightly less often, although the value of the market continues to increase. Downside potential to our outlook is the impact of credit tightening and the regional property slump, which may see some slowdown in the rate of sales.

Headline Expenditure Projections

Computer hardware sales: US$222mn in 2013 to US$261mn by 2017. Short-term increase in sales due to Windows 8 release, but long-term growth expected to slow considerably.

AV sales: US$345mn in 2013 to US$446mn in 2017, remaining the largest segment of the market. Flatpanel TVs will encourage strong growth, as consumers move to access more content.

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Handset sales: Smartphone sales will drive the market up from US$129mn in 2013 to US$209mn in 2017. While mobile handsets usually have higher replacement rates the higher cost of smartphones will reduce this somewhat.

Risk/Reward Rating

Oman's score was 47.1 out of 100.0, with a relatively small market offsetting its relatively high Country Risk score. Oman was eighth in our latest RRR table, but due to the relative affluence of Omani consumers this will remain a valuable regional market for vendors.

Key Trends & Developments

- Tablets are enjoying a boom in Oman. Despite originally being viewed as a consumer device, they are now being adopted increasingly in the enterprise segment. Tablets are generally significantly more expensive than smartphones, but prices will continue to fall. They are therefore an important growth area in 2013. Meanwhile, vendors are also heavily promoting the concept of ultrabooks.
- In Oman, TV sets account for more than half of all AV revenue. Flat-panel TV sets will be the main driver of AV category sales growth over the forecast period as consumers upgrade and trade their old models for digital. The market's development should be boosted after planned moves by the GCC to encourage a migration from analogue to digital TV broadcasting.
- The introduction of higher data transmission speeds will help to support the launch of new services over the next few years - this should help to stimulate strong growth within the smartphone sector. Increasing use of social media and mobile ecommerce are major factors driving the growth of the smartphone market in Oman. The advent of next generation 4G mobile services will provide a further incentive for mobile handset users to upgrade to smartphones as super-high internet speeds make it easier to access bandwidth-hungry video and data.

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