Sales of high-end smartphones Huawei P and M series continue to gain momentum, also in demand and more affordable devices of the Honor family, reports DigiTimes referring to industry sources among Taiwan's suppliers of electronic components. With this in mind, it is expected that in the third quarter of 2017, the Chinese company will outpace the closest competitor Apple and become the world's second largest smartphone manufacturer.
The trend to further strengthen the position of Huawei is noted by many leading analysts. So, from the recent report of IHS Markit, it became clear that in the second quarter of 2017, Huawei fell behind Apple by only 1% - the first accounted for 11% of the global volume of shipments of smartphones, while the second accounted for 12%.
Experts Canalys said that in the past quarter, Apple has delivered only 3 million more devices, and in the IDC research company called even less difference - 2.5 million units. According to the latter, Huawei shipped 38.5 million smartphones or 11.3% of the overall market result, and Apple's contribution was estimated at 41 million iPhone or 12%.
China remains one of the most important markets for Huawei. In the past quarter, the company has delivered 23.5 million smartphones in its country, improving its result of a year ago by 22.6%. At the same time, Apple, on the contrary, is losing its position in China - iPhone shipments fell by 7.6%, to 8 million units. Thus, in the Middle Kingdom, Huawei is already significantly ahead of the American rival - the share of vendors here is 21% and 7.1% respectively.
Huawei achieved success in other regions of the world - in the first half of 2017, shipments to Southeast Asia, Japan and Korea increased by more than 45%, while shipments to Europe increased by 18%. The most popular Huawei devices are used in such European countries as Germany, Finland and Poland, sources say..
Industry observers predict that, amid a seasonal increase in demand, Huawei will supply more than 40 million smartphones in the third quarter of 2017.
As for Apple, shipping its smartphones is likely to decrease slightly compared to the previous quarter, as many consumers will postpone the purchase of the iPhone for the final quarter of 2017, when a new generation of "apple" devices. Thus, Huawei has a real chance to bypass Apple and approach the market leader Samsung.