With reference to industry representatives, Digitimes has published a forecast related to the volume of shipments of smartphones with 5G support. Sales of smartphones capable of working on new-generation cellular networks are expected to rise this year, approaching 550 million units.
According to IDC, in 2020, 5G-enabled models accounted for about 10% of total smartphone production, which amounted to 1.29 billion units, a decrease compared to 2019 by 5.9%.
It’s easy to calculate that 5G smartphone sales are expected to quadruple this year. Obviously, the key promotion factors are lowering the cost of devices and expanding coverage.
500 million 5G users expected in 2021 in China alone
A Huawei spokesman has confirmed that the company will be attending Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2021, which will take place from 23 to 25 February this year. At this event, the company will showcase a wide range of new products, including new 5G base stations.
Huawei VP of Wireless Product Line Gan Bin said the global rollout of 5G networks has entered a fast phase. He also noted that this year the number of 5G users will exceed 500 million – and this is only in China.
Huawei expects 5G networks to start experiencing medium to high loads soon. The growth rate of 5G users in China will reach 30% in 2021, 42.9% in 2022, 56.8% in 2023, 70.4% in 2024 and 81.7% in 2025.
As a reminder, Huawei’s network equipment is banned in the US and some European countries that support US policy.
IDC: The smartphone market has returned to growth
Experts of the analytical company IDC summed up the results of the fourth quarter of 2020 and the whole year in general on the smartphone market. As stated in the corresponding report, the smartphone market returned to growth. Sales in the fourth quarter of 2020 were 385.9 million units, which is 4.3% more than smartphones sold in the fourth quarter of 2019. At the same time, for the entire 2020, smartphones were sold 5.9% less than in 2019.
Gizchina News of the week
At the end of the fourth quarter of 2020, Apple was named the market leader. It was able to increase sales in annual terms; that is, compared to the same quarter of the previous year, by 22.2% – from 73.8 to 90.1 million devices. This led to an increase in Apple’s share from 19.9% ββto 23.4%. The second place is occupied by Samsung, which in annual terms increased sales by 6.2%, as a result of which its share increased from 18.8% to 19.1%. The third place is taken by Xiaomi. Its share increased from 8.9% to 11.2%. The top five also include Oppo and Huawei. Also, The share of Oppo increased from 8.3% to 8.8%. The share of Huawei decreased from 15.2% to 8.4%.
As for 2020 as a whole, Samsung remained the leader with 20.6% of the market. Apple is in second place with 15.9%. The share of Huawei, which is in third place at the end of 2020, is 14.6%. The fourth-place belongs to Xiaomi, whose share is 11.4%, the fifth – to Vivo, whose share is 8.6%. In 2019, Samsung’s share was 21.6%, Apple’s 13.9%. Huawei – 17.5%, Xiaomi – 9.2%, Vivo – 8.0%.
