Looking around in Beijing's subways during the rush hour, one can see people in crowded carriages busy playing with their smartphones, among which iPhones make up a majority. This attests to a not-so-surprising fact - China has become Apple's growth engine.
It was reported that market demand in greater China, which includes the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Taiwan, drove much of Apple's quarterly performance, as revenues in the country grew 71 percent to $16.8 billion compared to the same quarter last year, overtaking Europe to become the company's second-largest market for the first time.
Chinese consumers' craze for Apple is nothing new. As a Financial Times article analyzed, the middle class in China contributed to such explosive iPhone sales. Whenever Apple launches a new product, it creates a frenzy in China. What explains China's love affair with Apple perhaps is consumers' thirst for creative and high-quality products that many other brands lack.
Many smartphone makers in China use Apple as a role model, but also try to make breakthroughs. Xiaomi, the Chinese smartphone maker that sold its first phone in 2011, is often dubbed the "Apple of China." Although there was a lot of whispering that Xiaomi started by copying Apple, its ambition to enter the global market has caught insiders' attention.
Xiaomi is striving to push into the Indian market. Analysts predict Xiaomi will have a good chance given the phone's price and the brand's burgeoning popularity in India.
More than 225,000 Indian customers registered to buy the Mi4i, Xiaomi's first phone to debut overseas, on a local major e-commerce site within two days.
Huawei, the Chinese phone-network equipment maker, while looking to Europe to help spur growth, admitted that its mobile business lags behind Apple's. However, its advantages still win it a lot of supporters. They find a Huawei smartphone cheaper and lighter in comparison to an iPhone. What's more, it has exactly the same usage with other phones.
In 2013, the sales of Huawei smartphones in Europe's big five markets - the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain - rose by 123 percent.
It seems that Chinese consumers did not show enough enthusiasm for domestic brands. Apple's booming sales in the Chinese market may serve as a reminder for domestic smartphones that they should avoid being a cheap Chinese knockoff but aim to be an innovation leader.
