Smartphones are a hot commodity inside of the world’s largest mobile community.
According to a new report from Needham & Company, which was covered Monday by Business Insider, the Chinese smartphone market has grown by 164% in the last year.
“The surge in China can be traced in part to the introduction of smartphones at materially lower prices that made them competitive with feature phones,” Needham & Company analyst Charlie Wolf said this week in his newest report. “A material percentage of these sales were captured by second-tier Chinese manufacturers.”
But if you think that Apple is the dominant player inside of China, you may want to reconsider that opinion. As of this writing, Android controls 70% of the Chinese smartphone market. iOS, on the other hand, controls only has 17.3%.
The good news is that Apple’s situation in China is similar to its situation in the U.S. just a few years ago. It’s not on the biggest carrier yet. Once Apple starts selling the iPhone on a bigger carrier, it should be able to sell even more iPhones in China and take market share.
Although iOS and Android have performed exceptionally well inside of China, nothing is more impressive than the rate of smartphone adoption itself. And it’s a trend that shows no sign of slowing any time soon.
