China smartphone market faces its biggest decline

The smartphone market in China has been one of the most popular smartphone markets in the world. However in recent times it has been noticed that China has faced the biggest decline with a plunge of more than 21% during the first quarter of 2018 compared to the same period in 2017. It was noticed that Chinese consumers bought just 91 million phones during the first three months of 2018.

The last time the figure went so low was during the fourth quarter of 2013. The decline was predicted earlier by Canalys analyst Mo Jia, but did not expect that the decline would be so low. The recent report has come after Samsung, which is one of the largest smartphone manufacturers in the world, which reported a 52% increase in the quarterly earnings compared to the previous year. However, Samsung has also warned about the sluggish demand for the smartphones which is expected to drag down the future earnings.

The slowdown has already affected the Samsung sales in China which is the world’s largest smartphone market. Samsung sold just 2 million devices in China during the first quarter of 2018, a figure which was down to more than 50% compared to the same period in 2017. Apart from Samsung even Apple has lost its grip in the Chinese market and has dropped two spots to sixth place. Research firm Canalys refused to reveal how many devices Apple sold in China but added that the company has suffered a significant decline in terms of shipments from the previous quarter.

On the other hand Huawei managed to dodge the declining trend in China and saw sales climb by 2%. With this the company remains the top smartphone seller in China. Other survivors in the market include Xiaomi, Vivo and Oppo. Xiaomi has become the only smartphone manufacturer that posted a double digit growth with sales up by 35%.

Photo Credits:  Forbes