Chinese smartphone vendors have reported selling over 450 million handsets until the end of this year, 38.6 % of the global total, according to a report published by Taiwanese market research company TrendForce, cited by CNet. Since entering the international market in 2011, the shipments of the Chinese manufacturers have grown by a rate of 50% each year.
The reported growth will slow down in 2015 to 17%, TrendForce expects, as the Chinese government plans to cut subsidies for smartphone manufacturers. Also, the mainland Chinese market is close to being saturated with smartphones, which will reduce the sales in the country. Still, the share of Chinese smartphones on the global market will stay around 40% next year, and possibly grow to over 60% in 2016. The top three Chinese smartphone manufacturers – Lenovo, Huawei and Xianomi – expect to ship over 60 million smartphones each until the end of this year. These quantities place them just under the leading manufacturers of the market, Apple and Samsung. The three companies plan to ship 100 million units each in 2015.
Samsung, the top Android smartphone producer of the globe, has expressed its doubts that Xiaomi can maintain its international success, after it has replaced the South Korean manufacturer as the top smartphone maker on the Chinese market. Xiaomi has chosen to sell its products online, which can save it a huge amount on marketing, but this strategy won’t work abroad, Samsung believes.
According to TrendForce’s report, although a third of what Huawei, ZTE and TCL ships is sold abroad, most other Chinese smartphone brands are local. To counter their home market’s saturation these companies will look for new markets abroad, aiming especially on Latin America and India, where smartphone penetration is low. The main selling point for their products will be their competitive price. On the local market these manufacturers can capitalize on the growing 4G penetration in China, which is expected to reach 40% in 2015.
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