Smartphone manufacturing trends and growth forecast for 2018

Smartphone manufacturing in 2018Research firm TrendForce has revealed the cost related challenges for global smartphone manufacturing and growth forecast for 2018.

The global smartphone manufacturing will be around 1.5 billion units in 2018, registering 2.8 percent growth. Lower demand and less replacement purchases will impact the growth in the worldwide smartphone production, says TrendForce.

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Smartphone manufacturing companies will face rise in the costs of components. Mobile phone vendors will have to re-consider the pricing or adjust the specification of end-products to cope with the cost pressures.

Smartphone vendors have lowered their quarterly production plans due to the cost pressures brought by excessive inventory.

Samsung will remain the top for smartphone production in 2018, and is expected to continue the success of its budget A and J series. The smartphone production of Samsung is estimated to drop 5 percent to 300 million units in 2018.

Apple’s iPhone production will increase 6 percent because of improved specifications of new iPhones and Apple’s expansion in Indian market.

LG previously announced its withdrawal from the China market, reflecting the inability of foreign brands to survive in the Chinese market.

Despite decline of production, LG will rank the seventh in smartphone market this year, with an expected production of 60 million units.

Sony has changed its product strategy in recent years, shifting to more profitable mid- and high-end phones. Sony will be manufacturing 15.3 million units, a 4 percent decline over the last year.

Nokia’s annual production volume for 2018 is estimated to grow by more than 70 percent and may exceed 20 million units.

Huawei will increase the use of in-house chips provided by HiSilicon in its smartphone lines, while actively developing 3D Sensing applications at the same time. It reduced the proportion of low-end mobile phones in its product mix last year, but will revise this strategy in 2018 to balance the development of all product lines.

Huawei will produce more than 173 million units for 2018, taking a market share of 11.6 percent.

The smartphone productions of OPPO and Vivo in 2018 are expected to drop by 5 percent respectively compared with 2017.

Xiaomi may surpass OPPO to take 4th place in the global market share. Xiaomi is facing rising component costs and higher tariffs in India.

Lenovo will produce 52 million smartphones this year, without registering any growth.
The smartphone production of Transsion is expected to grow by another 10 million units, reaching 50.7 million units in total in 2018.

ASUS and HTC will shrink the smartphone production in 2018. HTC will target at a smartphone production volume of 2 million units.