IDC : China smartphone market shrinks again, Apple gains big in premium segment
According to IDC, Chinese smartphone market has registered big decline as the market has become saturated. In 2017Q4, market declined by whopping 15.7% while it declined by 4.9% in 2017. As expected Apple dominated premium smartphone segment. Thanks to Apple iPhone X, Apple has increased average selling price by 23.9% compared to 2016Q4.
Huawei managed to stay at the top with 21.3% market share, increasing shipping volume by 6.5% compared to 2016Q4. OPPO continued to be #2, with 17.5% but they had lost 1.4% of market share from 2017Q3. Vivo is at number three, Xiaomi is at #4 and Apple rounded off the top 5. Coming to 2017 volumes, The table order remained the same as 2017Q4. Though Apple share decreased in 2017, they still managed to ship 41.1 million iPhones. Huawei shipped 90.9 million units and they are well on track to cross 100 million in 2018.
“In 2017, the minor upgrades that Chinese smartphone companies made to their offerings were not enough to move consumers to splurge on new models, resulting in a general slowdown in the market. The smaller players continued to suffer as the top five players grew their market share. A key space to look out for in the coming year would be how the top smartphone companies seek to tickle the fancy of consumers through their >US$200 products to drive consumer upgrades,” says Tay Xiaohan, Research Manager of IDC Asia/Pacific’s Client Devices team.
