IDC has published its latest China Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker for Q2 of 2013. For the three month period covered, China’s total mobile phone shipments reached 110 million. Smartphone shipments came in at 86 million, growing by an impressive 10% on a quarterly basis.
Not surprisingly, growth is expected to continue and aceelerate into 2014.
Driven by the subsidies of operators and the strong demand of consumers for upgrading mobile phones, IDC forecasts that China’s smartphone shipments will reach 360 million in 2013.
“The smartphone market has maintained a two-digit quarter-on-quarter growth rate in Q2 due to two reasons,” says Antonio Wang of IDC China. “First, the substantial shipments of low-end smartphones at a unit price of less than RMB 800 that support China Mobile’s 3G network. Second, the shipments prepared by mobile phone vendors to meet the market demands of students during the summer vacation.”
In particular, IDC estimates, Apple’s iPhone marketshare will double in China next year.
“The sharp increase in shipments of low-end China Mobile smartphones has driven the growth of Lenovo and Coolpad. On a separate note, affected by the sluggish sales of iPhone 5, Apple’s market share has declined dramatically, but its performance is expected to remarkably improve with the launch of the new iPhone,” added James Yan, Senior Analyst for China Mobile Phone Market at IDC China.
