Russia, the largest country in the world, has seen major changes in its phones, tablets, laptops, and household appliances market due to the withdrawal of western brands like Apple, Samsung, DJI, Ericsson, and more. As a result, experts are predicting that 90% of the brands sold in Russia will soon be Chinese.
The ongoing Ruso-Ukrainian War has forced the United States and the EU to take restrictive measures against Russia, significantly changing the smartphone and tech landscape in the country.
The smartphone market has been the most dynamic of all, considering the top 7 selling brands in the first half of 2022 have all been Chinese. Namely, Realme, Vivo, Xiaomi, Tecno, Infinix, ITel and Nokia. 
Kommersant, a Russian media outlet was told in Marvel Distribution- one of the largest broad-line IT distributors in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States, that more than 100% year-on-year growth was shown by the Tecno, Infinix, Realme, and Xiaomi devices in 2022.
Notably, Realme had sold only 498,000 units in the first half of 2021 in the country. However, this year, it has already sold more than 1.1 million units.
Growth in Chinese smartphone sales
Year-on-year unit sales grew significantly for brands like POCO (16%), Nokia (40%) while Apple’s and Samsung’s market share decreased by 14% and 15% year-on-year respectively.
Unit sales of brands like Tecno grew more than 20X in the last couple of months. Digma Electronics also saw positive growth of 8X in the same period. According to Yandex Market, the share of Chinese IT brands increased twofold year over year in the first quarter.
If experts are to be believed, the market may open its arms to brands such as Kimtigo, Akimojeba, Domfy, and Chuwi. According to M.Video-Eldorado, the largest Russian consumer electronic retail chain, “considering the shifting market conditions,” buyers are more inclined to pay attention to obscure or new brands mostly produced by Chinese, Turkish, or Russian companies.
There is a shortfall of spare components on the market in addition to the lack of ready-made devices. As a result, on June 28, the Russian Federation’s President signed legislation legalizing parallel imports in the country. Parallel Import enables you to import goods into the country without the official permission of the brand.
On May 6, the Ministry of Industry and Trade authorized a list of such goods, which included smartphones and electronics (Apple, Asus, HP, GoPro, Samsung, Dell, LG, Toshiba), household appliances (Electrolux, Dyson, Philips), and other items. Remarkably, smartphone deliveries have already begun under the parallel import approach.
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