This article is more than 1 year old

Huawei? Apple and Samsung's worst nightmare, pal

3 of the top 5 smartphone vendors now Chinese

Huawei claims to have banked over $11bn in smartphone revenue in 2014 despite falling short of its volume prediction.

Consumer chief Richard Yu says the Chinese giant shifted 75 million units in the year, a little short of the 80 million it had predicted - but still up 40 per cent from 2013, the WSJ reports.

Three of the top five smartphone vendors are now Chinese: Xiaomi, which overtook Samsung in sales in China last year, and Lenovo lead the also-rans behind Apple and Samsung. Huawei is a relative newcomer to consumer electronics, with its first models launching in 2011. Unlike oddball outfit Xiaomi, Huawei has conspicuously avoided the "Landfill" end of the market, and the razor-thin margins that go with doing business by the dumpster. The impecunious firm says it won't break the bank on marketing, either, to win share. Yet Huawei managed to show something Apple couldn't in 2014: a sapphire phone.

(For more on Xioami see Part 2 of our gigantic Mobile Review here)

Huawei's biggest consumer success in the UK came not from its flagships – the attractively designed (but underpowered) Ascend P7 or Mate 7 phablet, neither of which secured operator distribution in the UK – but from the £99 Kestrel it made for EE.

Huawei's consumer division also offered one of our favourite quotes last year, courtesy of the then-incumbent rotating CEO Eric Yu:

The Consumer Business Group may not be as down to earth as they used to be, simply because of the success they achieved last year. Therefore we cooled that down, so they can become sober to fully understand who they are and where they should go.

No doubt more sobriety is on the cards, then. ®

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like