Apple Inc was China’s top-selling smartphone brand in the final quarter of last year, industry research showed, taking top spot in the world’s largest mobile market for the first time since 2015.
The newly released iPhone 13 helped Apple outsell Chinese rivals Vivo Communication Technology Co (維沃) and Oppo Mobile Telecommunications Corp (歐珀) after Huawei Technologies Co (華為) plummeted down the rankings, Counterpoint Research said in a report yesterday.
Apple’s sales in the country surged 32 percent even while the overall domestic market shrank 9 percent, hurt by chip shortages and an economic slowdown that have constrained production and consumer demand.
Photo: Reuters
The shuffle marks a shift in market dynamics after US curbs on technology exports crippled Huawei’s smartphone business, briefly the world’s largest.
The Chinese networking giant was forced to spin off mobile arm Honor (榮耀) in 2020, which ranked fifth in the quarter after Xiaomi Corp (小米).
Apple’s Chinese market share hit a record 23 percent in the final three months of last year, Counterpoint estimated.
“Apple’s stellar performance was driven by a mix of its pricing strategy and gain from Huawei’s premium base,” research analyst Mengmeng Zhang (張蒙蒙) said in the report, which estimates sales of phones to end-users rather than shipments.
Globally, smartphone demand might remain depressed as inflationary pressures, an economic downturn and a slowing replacement cycle dampen sales, while a persistent chip shortage curtails output.
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The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
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