Richard Yu: Huawei has overtaken Apple as world's No. 2 smartphone maker

Huawei has become the second largest smartphone manufacturer in the world in terms of shipments and China's number one smart terminal manufacturer in terms of sales and brand satisfaction, Huawei Consumer Business CEO Richard Yu said on Saturday.

Speaking at a Huawei fans event, Yu said Huawei has also become China's largest watch producer and earphone maker. Huawei's tablets also surpassed Apple to become the number one in terms of market share in China in the third quarter.

He said that this is the beginning, and at the same time, the PC is also a new area for Huawei. Without this year's China-US trade war, Huawei's thin and light laptops could be the first.

He said that although Huawei's thin and light laptops are currently in the second position in the industry, Huawei will return to the first in the later stage, and Huawei's ecology will also go global.

Richard Yu also said Huawei's aim is to be first in each field they are in.

At a recent Huawei internal conference, Huawei Consumer Business CEO Richard Yu revealed that Huawei's global shipments of mobile phones will be around 230 million units this year, surpassing Apple ’s iPhone to rank second in the world.

More than a month ago, Huawei executives announced that its global shipments of mobile phones exceeded 200 million units, two months ahead of last year when Huawei shipped 206 million mobile phones. According to a preliminary estimate of 230 million units, this year's growth rate has reached 12%.

"230 million units have completed the task for the whole year, and finally how much we can achieve depends on the sprint in the last month. We have surpassed the Apple iPhone." Richard Yu said. The agency had previously predicted that Huawei ’s mobile phone shipments for the year would be 250 million.

iPhone shipments this year have not been announced, but with reference to Bank of America's forecast that global iPhone shipments will reach 202 million units in 2020, this year will not be higher than this number, or even less than 200 million units.