Xiaomi Targets 120 to 150 Million Smartphone Shipments in 2018: Report

Xiaomi has had one of the best runs in the smartphone market, giving serious competition to industry veterans such as Samsung and Huawei - in only a few years - in many markets including India. The Chinese electronics giant, according to online reports, is expected to beat its previous best by shipping over 120 million smartphone units in 2018. India has played a substantial part in the company's success with the budget Redmi series selling by the millions in the country.

This piece of news comes courtesy Digitimes citing a source from Taiwan's handset supply chain. Sources also estimate that with roughly 10 million handsets shipping per month, Xiaomi is close to hitting 120-150 million in terms of smartphone shipments this year.

The report claims that four major Chinese mobile giants - namely Huawei, Oppo, Vivo, and Xiaomi - have reworked their strategy for this year and will apparently work on expanding into foreign markets while creating a stronghold in the home country. This strategy has been put in place to compete for valuable market share in overseas markets. At a recent launch event, Xiaomi had said it managed to ship 90 million smartphones in 2017.

Back in November last year, Xiaomi had announced 70 million smartphone shipments within the first 10 months of 2017. Further, Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun had stated that the company was targeting 100 million units shipped in 2018.

On the other hand, Huawei has a bigger goal of shipping 200 million smartphone units thanks to the recently launched flagship P20 series. This is in comparison to 153 million units that the brand shipped in 2017. Finally, BBK-owned Oppo and Vivo are targeting emerging markets with their affordable, AI-focused offerings that will be unveiled in the second quarter this year.