On February 4, global technology market research firm Counterpoint released a report saying that Huawei ranked first in smartphone sales in the first two weeks of 2024, according to the latest data tracked by its weekly smartphone sales model in China.。

Counterpoint believes that this latest data shows that Huawei is making a strong return to the Chinese market.。Huawei's share of sales has been declining since the imposition of U.S. sanctions in 2019, and the summit marks its first return to the championship.。

Counterpoint mentioned in the report that the Mate 60 series, equipped with its self-developed Kirin 9000S chip, is a key driver of Huawei's recent success.。In addition, its strong brand loyalty and the successful launch of the HarmonyOS operating system have also helped it.。

Huawei's Mate 60 series went on sale at the end of August and then exploded the market。Although it is only sold in the Chinese market, online and offline channels are hard to find, directly driving the surge in Huawei's mobile phone sales.。

According to data previously released by Counterpoint, from the third quarter of 2023, Huawei mobile phones began to grow against the trend.。In the third quarter, Huawei's mobile phone sales increased by 37% year-on-year, and its market share in China increased to 12.9%, an increase of 3% over the same period last year..8 percentage points。In the fourth quarter, Huawei again recorded a year-on-year increase of 71.1%, further expanding market share to 15.2%, an increase of 5% over the same period last year..7 percentage points。

For the full year 2023, Huawei's mobile phone shipments increased by 52.1%, market share is 12.1%, an increase of 4.2 percentage points, ranked sixth。The top three were Apple (17.9%), Vivo (16.9%), Oppo (16.2%)。

It is worth noting that the Huawei Mate 60 series is actually aimed at the high-end machine market.。Therefore, if you only look at the high-end machine market, Huawei's market share will increase even more.。Counterpoint reports that China's premium smartphone market grew 27% in 2023。Apple maintains market leadership with its outstanding performance in the first half of 2023。However, starting in the third quarter of 2023, Apple's market share began to be eroded by Huawei and other Chinese brands.。

In addition, Huawei's continued efforts in folding screen phones are also an important factor in its market share of high-end smartphones.。

After the launch of the Mate 60 series, Huawei immediately released a new folding screen mobile phone Mate X5, which is also popular with consumers.。According to Counterpoint, the phone took 7% of the market in the third quarter of last year, not long after the Huawei Mate X5 was launched.。And in China's folding screen mobile phone sales in the top five, Huawei accounted for three seats。

In addition, according to another research organization BCI data, in the fourth quarter of 2023, in China's folding screen mobile phone market, Huawei with a high of 51.23% market share "dominates" the segment, Glory (15.54%) and Samsung (15.23%) are ranked second and third.。

Tianfeng Securities mentioned in a recent research report that it continues to be optimistic about the rapid growth of sales of folding screen phones in the Chinese market, and believes that folding screens will become the direction of high-end phone iteration.。Tianfeng Securities expects China's folding screen shipments to be around 10 million units in 2024。

The Counterpoint report said that it is expected that Chinese brands will continue to exert force in the high-end market.。In addition to Huawei, other Chinese mobile phone manufacturers such as Xiaomi, Oppo, Vivo, etc. have begun to impact the high-end mobile phone market and have achieved certain results, such as Xiaomi 14 has achieved good market performance.。The market is expected to follow China's high-end machine market competition will become increasingly fierce。The previous high-end machine market dominated by Apple may be gone forever.。