Xiaomi for the first time has surpassed Samsung and Apple to become the number one smartphone brand in the world in June, a Counterpoint Research report showed on Thursday, August 5. Xiaomi's sales grew 26% (month-on-month) in June, making it the fastest-growing brand for the month.
Xiaomi was also the number two brand globally for Q2 2021 in terms of sales, and cumulatively, has sold close to 800 million smartphones since its inception in 2011, according to Counterpoint Research's Monthly Market Pulse Service.
"Ever since the decline of Huawei commenced, Xiaomi has been making consistent and aggressive efforts to fill the gap created by this decline. The OEM has been expanding in Huawei's and HONOR's legacy markets like China, Europe, Middle East and Africa," said Research Director Tarun Pathak.
"In June, Xiaomi was further helped by China, Europe and India's recovery and Samsung's decline due to supply constraints," he added.
China's market grew 16%(MoM) in June driven by the 618 festival.
"Xiaomi was the fastest growing OEM, riding on its aggressive offline expansion in lower-tier cities and solid performance of its Redmi 9, Redmi Note 9 and the Redmi K series," said Senior Analyst Varun Mishra, commenting on the China market and Samsung supply constraints.
At the same time, due to a fresh wave of COVID-19 pandemic in Vietnam, Samsung's production was disrupted in June, which resulted in the brand's devices facing shortages across channels.
"Xiaomi, with its strong mid-range portfolio and wide market coverage, was the biggest beneficiary from the short-term gap left by Samsung's A series," Mishra added.
Meanwhile, Samsung Electronics is expected to dominate the foldable smartphone market this year with an 88% share, a report showed on Friday, as the tech giant prepares to unveil its new foldable devices next week.
The global foldable market is estimated to triple from a year earlier to reach around 9 million units in 2021, and Samsung, the world's largest smartphone vendor, is projected to represent 88%, according to market tracker Counterpoint Research.
"Although the market for foldables is still niche, we expect 2021 shipments of Samsung foldable smartphones to grow significantly, driven by improved design and hardware, and competitive pricing," it said.