It goes without saying how much Huawei has disrupted the global smartphone market. Unfortunately, the once-promising manufacturer fell victim to US sanctions and could not bring smartphones to consumers without Android and Google apps. Unless that changes, it’s relatively unlikely that Huawei will make a comeback – no matter how much work they do on the “homegrown” Harmony OS.
Foldables: The demand has increased rapidly
But now it is A statistic emerges, which surprised me. In fact, Huawei (at least in its home country China) can even call itself the market leader in a very specific discipline if Counterpoint’s current numbers are to be believed.
Of course, it’s about the up-and-coming device class of foldables that are becoming increasingly popular. Although they still do not account for a very large proportion of total smartphone sales in China, However, demand has increased tremendously in the first quarter of 2022. Unfortunately, analysts cannot answer the exact reason: “Patriotic consumption or brand awareness or product quality?”
“Huawei is aggressively targeting the foldable smartphone segment in China, which accounted for about 7 percent of smartphone sales in China from January to May 2022. The manufacturer accounts for more than 50 percent of foldable sales in China, far ahead of the competition. Samsung, one of the few companies that sells its foldables in Germany and the global foldable leader, is far behind in second place with 15 percent – ​​and the trend is declining.
By the way: The Huawei foldable is even sold in Germany After the first phase of the typical book cover design, the Huawei P50 Pocket was presented in the so-called clamshell format. This is with a relatively low price (From 1,099 euros) is particularly an option Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3 To illustrate.
A few more foldables are coming this year
According to Counterpoint, the overall Chinese smartphone market will weaken slightly in 2022, which is why Chinese OEMs are aiming for more market penetration in the premium segment. Brands like Oppo, Xiaomi and Vivo have also turned to foldable devices to conquer China’s premium market. We should be able to count on at least four to five new foldables in the second half of the year, although the number of market launches in Europe is still manageable. We should be able to expect the first such smartphone from Google this year.
I have been following developments in the foldable industry with excitement and I am very sorry that the selection in Germany is still so small. After all, you don’t want to import such an expensive device from China if you can’t rely on customer service if you have a problem. Have you ever wanted to fold one?
