Smart speaker market grows 55% year-on-year to 3Q 2019

Tuesday, November 26th, 2019
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Strategy Analytics: Prime Day Smart Speaker Sales Boost Keeps Amazon Well Ahead of the Chasing

MILTON KEYNES, England — Amazon shipped 10.5 million of its own-branded Echo smart speakers in Q3 2019, its second highest ever total for a single quarter as the company stretched its lead over its closest rivals. The global market for smart speakers grew 55% year-on-year to 34.9 million units shipped with Chinese vendors Baidu, Alibaba and Xiaomi all enjoying above average growth in demand.

Smart Speaker Shipments by Vendor - Q3 2019

Google suffered a slowdown in the quarter due to its ageing product range and lack of a tent pole sales event. However, the company still managed to grow its smart speaker shipments by 16% year-on-year and will be hopeful of better fortunes in Q4 with a revamped product line and plans for a wide range of promotional activity around Black Friday.

David Watkins, Director at Strategy Analytics, commented: “Amazon had a stellar Q3, reasserting itself as the dominant global force in the smart speaker market. A well rounded product range coupled with deep discounting and a trade-in program that incentivizes users to stay in the Amazon ecosystem as well as entice new users, have helped Amazon climb back up to 30% market share from just 22% in Q2 2019.”

David Mercer, Vice President at Strategy Analytics, added , “China is the largest smart speaker market in the world, accounting for 36% of global shipments over the past quarter. Baidu claimed top spot domestically in Q3 amid intense competition from Alibaba and Xiaomi. The three Chinese tech heavyweights have made the domestic smart speaker market their own by engaging in seemingly endless rounds of discounting and promotional activity that has made it extremely difficult for other established electronics companies or tech start-ups to gain a foothold in the market. How long this can be sustained remains to be seen and now the burning question on every investor’s lips now is how and most importantly when they will find a path to monetization of their user base.”