Smartphone clash to get fierce, but chip shortage to ease, Realme predicts

The competition in the Chinese smartphone market will further intensify in 2022, but a chip shortage that has been affecting the global smartphone industry for nearly two years has eased, said a senior company executive.

Xu Qi, vice-president of Realme, a fast-growing Chinese smartphone brand, said since the beginning of this year, the shortage of mobile phone chips has eased, and the prices of some chips have fallen.

According to him, due to a larger-than-expected decline in the smartphone market in the first two months, the competition in the mobile phone market will further intensify this year.

In February, smartphone shipments in China witnessed a year-on-year drop of 31.8 percent to 14.55 million units, according to data from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, a Beijing-based think tank.

Xu attributed the sharp decline to such factors as a traditionally slack season after the booming sales of the Spring Festival holiday and logistics challenges intensified by the COVID-19 pandemic.

According to him, the fall is short-term, and the market will improve later this year. Realme also maintained its target of achieving 50 percent year-on-year growth in sales volume in 2022, with about 30 percent year-on-year growth in the Chinese smartphone market, and above 50 percent rise in overseas markets.

"What we need to do is to ensure the competitiveness of our products. We still have expectations for the second and third quarters. Our sales in April, May and June will further increase," Xu said.

On Tuesday, the company unveiled its new smartphone Realme GT Neo3 series, which are tailor-made to attract gaming enthusiasts. The GT Neo 3 comes with a MediaTek's Dimensity 8100 chipset, 6.7-inch screen, and a triple camera system.