Huawei overtook Apple in June and July smartphone sales, but high-profile launches this month will prove decisive

Huawei overtook Apple to capture second spot for global smartphone shipments for the first time, during June and July and is looking good for August too, amid a relatively quiet marketplace ahead of a wave of new launches in September and October, according to a research note from Hong Kong-based Counterpoint on Wednesday.

The Shenzhen-based handset maker registered strong June and July sales, moving ahead of its major competitor, Apple’s iPhone.

With August sales also looking good for the Chinese vendor, the research agency expects the monthly lead to have continued last month.

Without giving specific sales data for either company for the previous three months, Counterpoint’s research director Peter Richardson said Huawei’s first successful toppling of Apple represents a significant milestone for China’s largest smartphone brand, and “speaks volumes of how far this primarily network infrastructure vendor has grown in the consumer mobile handset space in the last three to four years”.

Despite the caveat, however, that the leading streak could be temporary, given Apple is poised to release its new generation iPhone 8 next week, Richardson said it nevertheless underscores the rate at which Huawei has been growing, driven by consistent investment in research and development and manufacturing, coupled with aggressive marketing and sales channel expansion.

The latest figures issued by US-based researcher International Data Corporation (IDC), meanwhile, suggest global smartphone sales dropped 1.3 per cent to 341.6 million during the second quarter, but that all of the top five vendors – Samsung, Apple, Huawei, Oppo, and Xiaomi – gained market shares in the period.