For the past few years, Chinese manufacturer Transsion Holdings has dominated the smartphone market in Africa, with over $1 billion in revenue. Its brands include phone brands like Tecno, iTel, Infinix, after-sale service brand Carlcare and accessories brand Oraimo.
Tecno Mobile is the most popular brand owned by Transsion scooping the lion’s share of the smartphone market in Africa. According to Statcounter, Tecno takes 30.74% of the mobile vendor market share in Uganda currently and that is the most that any smartphone maker has.
The image below shows the actual statistics of the bestselling smartphones in Uganda.
Tecno phones have always been the obvious alternative for Ugandans who are on a budget and want the most value for their money. I mean, just look at some of the deals offered on Jumia for Tecno phones.
Lowest
| PHONE | MEMORY | PRICE (UGX) |
| TECNO F1 | 1GB RAM, 8GB ROM | 200,000 |
| TECNO POP 3 | 1GB RAM, 16GB ROM | 255,000 |
| TECNO POP 2F | 1GB RAM, 16GB ROM | 265,000 |
| TECNO POP 2 PLUS | 1GB RAM, 16GB ROM | 300,000 |
Highest
| PHONE | MEMORY | PRICE (UGX) |
| TECNO CAMON 16 PREMIER | 8GB RAM, 128GB ROM | 1,050,000 |
| TECNO PHANTOM 9 DUAL | 6GB RAM, 128GB ROM | 1,350,000 |
| TECNO CAMON 15 PREMIER | 6GB RAM, 128GB ROM | 935,000 |
| TECNO POUVOIR 4 PRO | 6GB RAM, 128GB ROM | 730,000 |
I reckon these prices can drop way lower if you negotiate with a dealer or swap and top up. This is one of the reasons why we love Tecno phones.
How Tecno Is Ruining User Experience
1. Bloatware
Bloatware simply refers to unwanted software (apps) that is included on a mobile device by the manufacturer. Tecno smartphones come with a lot of useless applications that a user does not need.
Other times these applications install themselves automatically under HiOS. These applications cannot be uninstalled because they are under system applications.
All these applications do is reduce storage space and consume the user’s mobile internet. Old Tecno phones did not have much of this bloatware. It is hard to understand why they are including this bad software on their devices when they are doing better than ever.
Other times the system takes up more storage as the phone is updated. This must be a way the company compels a user to buy their new devices. This is not right. On average, a Tecno user may use their device for only a year before it malfunctions.
2. Ads
Ads or advertisements are unrelated and irrelevant pictures or videos that pop-up on your screen when you are using an application or just take up a small proportion of your screen. Tecno is fond of using ads to monetize applications.
Many of the applications pre-installed in Tecno phones display ads to the extent that they even appear on the home screen. This makes the user experience horrible. We do not have to imagine how bad pop-ups can be because we already have Tecno phones.
What is disappointing is that the same company that makes Tecno (Transsion Holdings) also makes Infinix software. XOS does not have as many ads as HiOS though, the recent devices are being infested by them too.
How long until people get tired of the issues with the brand and decide to move on to something better? I think this is one of those situations where Tecno knows its phones do not keep value for long and so it decides to maximise both sales and profits by monetizing everything.
Conclusion
If you do not mind the bloatware and ads, think about the privacy of your data. These applications can also be used to steal your data and there have been claims that Tecno is carrying out data theft on Africans.
I advise you to uninstall the bloatware and as a hack, install XOS on the phones. It is better. Unless the company changes the way it designs its software and also improves on the user experience, then I argue it will not be where it is in 5 years.
It could come up with some kind of tax that it adds to the final price to make up for what it loses when it does not display ads. Sales matter but they do not last without user satisfaction.
What are your thoughts on this subject? Do you think Tecno really needs to change its ways too? Leave us a comment and we will be glad to chat more.
Also read: 5 Good Smartphone Brands With Their Own Issues
