Cricket legend Sachin Tendulkar made tech headlines this week, thanks to his new partnership with OpenAI's ChatGPT. However, this isn't the first time the Master Blaster has stepped into tech, as almost a decade ago, Sachin backed an Indian smartphone brand that wanted to take on the giants. So, what was this brand and where is it now?
Sachin Tendulkar's First Tech Bet: Smartron
Sachin Tendulkar's big bet was on a brand called Smartron. It was founded in August 2014 in Hyderabad by Mahesh Lingareddy and aimed to become India's own global tech brand, making everything from phones to laptops and even smart home devices.
In March 2016, Sachin Tendulkar bought a stake in Smartron. It was his first-ever investment in a tech startup and he ended up becoming the company's brand ambassador. However, the deal amount was never publicly revealed.
In an interview, Sachin said, "I have always been fascinated by technology. Smartron's founding vision for the need for a robust product ecosystem in the country to grow is very impressive."
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Smartron Debuted t.book and t.phone with Sachin at the Helm
Smartron's first product was the t.book, a 2-in-1 Windows laptop that doubled as a tablet, priced at Rs 39,999. Sachin himself unveiled the t.phone on May 19, 2016.
The t.phone was a proper flagship for its time, with a 5.5-inch Full HD Super AMOLED display, the Snapdragon 810 chipset, 4 GB of RAM and 64 GB of storage. The phone also came with unlimited cloud storage through Smartron's t.cloud service and cost Rs 22,999, pitting it against the likes of OnePlus and Xiaomi.
However, Smartron's most famous phone arrived in May 2017. It was called the srt.phone, and "srt" stood for Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. Smartron said the phone was built to be "dependable", just like Sachin.
The srt.phone had a 5.5-inch Full HD display, the Snapdragon 652, a 13 MP rear camera and a 3,000mAh battery with fast charging. It cost Rs 12,999 for the 32 GB model and Rs 13,999 for the 64 GB model and was sold exclusively on Flipkart.
Moving on, Smartron kept expanding beyond smartphones. In January 2018, the brand launched the t.phone P, a budget phone with a huge 5,000mAh battery for just Rs 7,999. A few months later came the t.band fitness tracker.
However, Smartron's bigger focus was shifting to IoT (Internet of Things). In 2017, it launched tronX, an AI-powered platform for smart homes and offices. Then, in July 2018, the brand launched the TRONX ONE, which it called India's first smart crossover electric bike.
More e-bikes, the tbike OnePro and tbike flex, followed in December 2020. By early 2018, Smartron had reportedly raised about Rs 200 crore and was looking to raise $500 million more for its expansion plans.
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The Slow Descent of Smartron
After 2020, Smartron slowed down its smartphone and gadget production. The brand never officially explained why it stopped making phones or other gadgets. However, it's clear that competition was the main reason for the brand's decline.
In 2016 and 2018, Chinese brands like Xiaomi took over India's smartphone market with aggressive prices. Even big Indian brands like Micromax, Lava and Intex lost most of their market share during this period.
Compared to them, Smartron was a smaller and younger player and lacked the economies of scale one would have needed to sustain in the competitive smartphone market. The t.phone P in 2018 turned out to be the brand's last smartphone. After that, the company focused on IoT and e-bikes instead, which also ended production by 2023.
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What Happened to Smartron?
If you visit the official Smartron website today, you will be greeted with a simple message: "Smartron’s journey began in 2014 with engineering at its core and a vision far ahead of its time. The journey paused in 2024, but the work remains. This site is a record of what we built, the technology we pioneered, and the vision that drove it."
However, the story doesn't end there. The team behind Smartron has launched a new company, tronX. It describes itself as a deep-tech company building an AI platform that works across phones, earbuds, wearables, smart home devices and even vehicles.
Smartron may have faded from the smartphone scene, but its tech journey didn't end there. The company has evolved into an AI-focused venture, while Sachin Tendulkar has now partnered with OpenAI's ChatGPT.
It's an interesting full-circle moment for the Master Blaster, who went from backing an Indian hardware startup to being associated with one of the biggest names in AI. Now, only time will tell how it all pans out.
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