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HUAWEI has now dropped out of the top five in its home market
- HUAWEI has fallen out of the top five in China, according to a Q2 2021 market share report.
- HONOR has climbed into the top five though, marking its first appearance since splitting from HUAWEI.
A long-running US trade ban means HUAWEI has gone from threatening Samsung and being a number two player to dropping out of the top five in terms of global market share. The Chinese manufacturer has thrived in its home market for the longest time though, but it looks like tough times are afoot here too.
The IDC has released its Q2 2021 market share report for China (h/t: GSMArena) and it noted that HUAWEI is no longer a top-five player in its home country. Instead, the firm is now lumped into the “other” category.
This is a pretty drastic if unsurprising turn of events, as HUAWEI was a firm number two prior to the trade ban, having passed Apple for the runner-up spot. The US sanctions bit hard outside China straight away due to the lack of Google support, but it was able to initially lean on its home market to keep shipments up. However, this latest news suggests the sanctions are seriously affecting HUAWEI’s supply chain and sales in both global and Chinese markets.
HUAWEI is set to launch its P50 series of phones tomorrow (July 29), but we’ll need to wait and see if the manufacturer has stockpiled enough components to deliver plenty of units. Perhaps the biggest concern for the manufacturer is its stockpile of in-house Kirin 9000 chipsets, as chipmaker TSMC only produced a small number of these chips prior to the US barring it from working with HUAWEI. But several rumors have pointed to the possibility of Qualcomm providing 4G chipsets to the manufacturer in some capacity.
vivo was the top performer during the quarter otherwise, accruing 23.8% market share or 18.6 million units sold in China. Fellow BBK brand OPPO was in second place with 21.1% market share or 16.5 million units sold. Xiaomi rounded out the top three with 17.2% of the market (13.4 million units sold).
Apple and newly independent HONOR occupied the fourth and fifth spots respectively, accruing 10.9% and 8.9% shares of the market respectively. We’re glad to see HONOR tentatively bouncing back after being spun off from HUAWEI, and it’s also holding its first post-HUAWEI global launch next month. So all eyes will be on the company to see if it can claw back any market share lost by HUAWEI.