Key growth phases of the Chinese smartphone market

I have a pleasure to recall that, there were three key growth phases of the Chinese smartphone market seen in the past few years. The first phase (before 2014) was when it was driven mainly by operators. Samsung, Lenovo, and Coolpad led the smartphone market then with the help of huge subsidies offered by operators.

In the second phase (2014-2015), with e-commerce booming in China, Xiaomi was one of the first vendors that leveraged the e-commerce wave and disrupted the market by selling its phones online through its flash sales. 

IDC reveals that, the third phase unfolded this 2016, where the share of phones sold online has started to stabilize, with OPPO and vivo that triumphed due to their strengths in the offline channels especially in Tier 3 to Tier 5 cities.