IFA 2015 Consumer Electronics And Appliances Trade Fair (Photo : Getty Images)
In 2015, Chinese tech giant Huawei shipped 108 million smartphones. The 44 jump in shipment, due to the strong domestic and Western Europe sales, beats the ongoing market slowdown.
Competitors Apple and Samsung are expecting a tough 2016, while the global smartphone industry is expected to log a single-digit growth in 2015 for the first time, reports China Technology News. The popularity of Huawei smartphones could be attributed to the more affordable prices of its handsets, while offering technology that could match those offered by more expensive units.
It is true not only for Huawei but also other Chinse phone giants such as Lenovo and Xiaomi and even newer players such as LeTV which introduced its Le Max Pro smartphone at the ongoing CES 2016. LeTV made smartphone history by being the first to use the Qualcomm Snapdragon 820 chipset on its newly launched Le Max Pro, its third handset after the company expanded its business beyond online streaming of movies.
Avril Wu, TrendForce analyst, notes, "There are increasingly more Chinese vendors who can offer good products, so you don't necessarily have to buy a phone from Samsung."
Carolina Milanesi, Kantar Worldpanel ComTec analyst, points out that despite the tremendous growth experienced by Huawei the past two quarters, foreign and local phonemakers have to fight for a larger share of the smartphone market, especially those using the Android ecosystem.
As of the third quarter 2015, Samsung is still the king of the smartphone market with a 23.8 percent market share, followed by Apple 13.5 percent and Huawei 7.5 percent. That only means that despite the double-digit growth and breaching the 100 millionth mark, the Shenzhen-based Huawei would still need to double time to catch up with the international leaders and beat local competitors.
Using the same strategy of launching phones with lower prices but great specs, Huawei rolled out at the CES 2016 the Honor 5X, priced at $199. With its offer of fingerprint sensor, 1080p 5.5-inch display, Snapdragon 615 processors, 2GB of RAM, 13-megapixel camera and 3,000 mAh battery, The Verge describes the new smartphone as feeling "a lot more solid and expensive that it really is.
