brands come to mind either apple or
samsung these two tech giants have
dominated the smartphone industry for
several years apple's iphone and
samsung's galaxy phones are household
brands known by anyone who uses a
smartphone but now the game has changed
china has turned the tables around in
the past chinese smartphone brands like
huawei xiaomi and oneplus were mostly
for the budget conscious these phones
weren't as powerful as others and their
specs weren't too impressive either now
these brands are going head-to-head with
the world's smartphone giants in fact
they've captured around 40 percent of
the global smartphone market share how
did chinese smartphone makers make the
leap what are their goals
let's find out more
made in china 2025. before we look into
the major chinese smartphone brands
let's explore what they're trying to
achieve chinese president xi jinping has
an ambitious plan called made in china
2025. here china seeks to eventually
overtake the united states as the global
leader in top technology sectors
including semiconductors artificial
intelligence robotics smartphones and
electric vehicles this plan also sparked
the trade war between the us and china
during the time of president donald
trump the u.s government didn't want
china to gain the upper hand so it
enacted a lot of restrictions on chinese
manufacturers it cost both countries
billions of dollars china though is
persistent in its push to create export
quality high-tech products the country
is making a lot of effort to push away
from low-value commodity manufacturing
and into more advanced industries
flooding the market with competitive
smartphones is one of their ways of
achieving this goal now let's see what
these major chinese smartphone makers
have to offers
for most people who are into tech huawei
needs no introduction it's the world's
second largest smartphone company and it
also manufactures hardware for cell
towers and other communications
equipment huawei is also at the
forefront of the u.s china trade war and
the two nations battle for tech
dominance in the u.s most people hadn't
even heard of huawei until it became
controversial it consistently made
headlines around the world especially
when the u.s commerce department
required u.s companies to secure a
special license first before they could
do business with huawei as a result of
this ban huawei lost access to us-made
semiconductors also the company lost its
ties with google which runs most of the
software on the popular android
operating system as a consequence any
apps that depended on google services to
work like uber and ebay wouldn't
properly work on huawei devices google
owned apps like maps and youtube were
out of the question as well to address
this problem huawei took matters into
their own hands the company created its
own app store called huawei app gallery
there users could find alternatives to
apps that wouldn't work without google
services that move allowed huawei to
launch more premium smartphones like the
mate 30. at launch this was the
company's first flagship phone that
didn't come with google apps eventually
huawei launched and sold even more
premium phones growing their earnings to
about 65 billion dollars in 2020
xiaomi xiaomi is a more recent company
it was established only in 2010 and it
has quickly become one of the world's
leaders in smartphones as of 2019 more
than
124 million jiomi phones have been
shipped to over 90 countries the secret
to xiaomi's success is selling phones
with good specs for a fraction of the
price of the more popular brands jaomi
phones offer excellent alternatives to
popular flagship phones especially for
people with tight budgets
that's the market geome initially
targeted making it popular in countries
like india in fact jaomi phones in india
sell out within hours of their release
the company has even created a phone
that costs only a hundred dollars though
most of jiomi's income is generated from
smartphone sales the company also sells
software and services used by its phones
this allows the company to price its
phones lower
in addition xiaomi has a wide range of
other smart devices like electric
scooters robot vacuum cleaners
dishwashers and air purifiers these
products have helped put its mi brand in
the international marketplace in recent
years though xiaomi has doubled down on
selling premium phones over the cheaper
ones the strategy has worked well for
the company letting them grow their
revenues by 14 in the first quarter of
2020. in contrast smartphone giants
apple and samsung slated that the year
ahead will be quite challenging
oppo and vivo these two are related
companies oppo being the older and
larger sibling in the u.s oppo and vivo
really aren't that well known but they
have managed to climb to within the top
six smartphone manufacturers in the
world vivo phones did make a few cameos
in the movie captain america civil war
also the company has even clinched an
endorsement deal with nba legend stephen
curry this is their exact strategy high
profile product placements and
sponsorships to capture the western
market
vivo like geome also makes more
affordable phones with specs comparable
to more expensive brands the popularity
of these phones with young adults
springboarded the company to fame and
fortune both oppo and vivo have also
gained larger market shares amidst the
covet 19 pandemic this is in large part
thanks to their strong presence in asia
particularly in china and india which
are the world's two largest smartphone
markets both oppo and vivo say that they
are competitors to one another however
both companies actually grew out from
the same parent company which is
electronics
one plus
oneplus has made its presence known in
the u.s market much earlier than other
chinese smartphone makers the company
managed to break into the u.s smartphone
market within just seven years since it
was established oneplus is based in
shenzhen which is known as the tech
center of china it started out as an
online only seller of affordable
high-end phones in 2018 oneplus stood on
the shoulder of a u.s telecom giant
t-mobile this was the first ever
partnership oneplus had with an american
telco it propelled oneplus to great
success as many americans opt to get
their phones through contracts with
mobile carriers also that meant that
oneplus phones would be available in
every t-mobile store in the united
states the strong partnership was marked
by the release of the oneplus 6t series
of flagship phones as of last year
oneplus remains as one of the fastest
growing smartphone manufacturers in the
us last april the company even launched
another flagship series the oneplus 8 in
the middle of a pandemic the oneplus 8
is backed by verizon another popular us
mobile carrier
lenovo lenovo is mostly known for its
laptops and desktops but aside from
computers lenovo also owns one of the
world's most well-respected phone brands
motorola which it acquired from google
last 2015 though the company suffered
years of losses lenovo's mobile division
managed to turn the tables in 2019 then
in 2020 lenovo launched a range of
phones in different price ranges under
the motorola brand including the
revamped razer phones lenovo is also
developing gaming class phones under its
legion brand which is also well known in
the domain of gaming laptops
realme realme is a very recent company
founded in 2018 by a former executive of
oppo in a similar way realme produced
cheaper phones which have beefed up
specs and that's how they succeeded in
2019 parent company bbk electronics
reported that realme shipped 25 million
phones last 2020 the company released
its first ever 5g capable phone which
pushed it into the premium smartphone
Tcl
tcl is best known for making televisions
but it actually makes phones as well in
the past tcl made phones for different
brands like alcatel blackberry and palm
but in april of 2020 tcl released the 10
series which has decent specs and
included a model with 5g capability
aside from that tcl has plans to be the
next big thing in foldable phones they
already have concepts for a tri-fold
phone and a rollable phone chinese
smartphone brands have certainly gone a
long way from the reputation of being
cheap and unreliable now the tide has
shifted granting chinese brands more
dominance in the international
smartphone market they can only perform
better in the future especially as the
current biden administration has relaxed
the trade restrictions for chinese
companies pretty soon they may even
overtake apple and samsung as world
leading smartphone maker
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