Huawei Overtakes Apple As World’s Second Largest Smartphone Company

Samsung has long been the number one smartphone company in the world. For years, Apple has held on to the second spot securely. Over the past few quarters, though, we’ve seen Huawei catching up to Apple. The latest report from market analysis firm Counterpoint Research reveals that Huawei has actually crossed Apple and is now the world’s second largest smartphone company (by number of units shipped) as of the second quarter of this year.

Huawei is only behind Samsung now as far as global smartphone sales are concerned, Counterpoint says that Huawei has been able to achieve this milestone by consistently investing in research and development as well as relying on creative and aggressive marketing campaigns.

It merits mentioning here, though, that Apple is likely to bounce back and take this position from Huawei in the coming months. The company is due to unveil its new iPhones later this month and their sales will dictate where it stands in the coming quarter.

The report also points out that Huawei has a limited presence in key markets across South Asia, and North America. This is going to limit the company’s potential in the mid-term to sustain its second position behind Samsung.

Huawei’s improved ranking simply doesn’t mean that people are now buying fewer iPhones and more Huawei handsets. Apple has a much higher profit margin on its handsets so it ends up making more money compared to its rivals.

The iPhones are sought after handsets. The report itself mentions that despite slipping down to third place, the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus remained the best selling smartphones in the world. On the contrary, none of Huawei’s phones made it to the top 10 list.

Focusing on creating a lot of market share, which is what Samsung and Huawei both do, has its benefits as well. It enables the company to reach out to more potential customers and establish their brand presence quickly in new markets.

Apple hasn’t relied on this strategy a lot really and it has worked out just fine for the company.

Adnan Farooqui
Categories: Cellphones
Tags: Huawei, Samsung