Earlier this year, Huawei signed a five-year global supply deal with Vodafone for exclusively Vodafone-branded handsets based on the third generation (3G) mobile technology.

The deal marks a major breakthrough for Huawei in the European handset market. Vodafone, the world's largest cellular operator by revenue, has also signed a network equipment supply deal with Huawei.

Currently, Huawei's handset sales mainly come from overseas markets, but Guo said he expected the firm to grab a larger share of the domestic market.

However, Huawei faces major challenges in the domestic handset market, which is dominated by manufacturers rather than operators. Pang Jun, an analyst with retail data tracking firm GFK China estimates that customized phones currently account for about 15 per cent of China's total market.

But Guo said customizing mobile phones would remain Huawei's top priority.
"As a leading networks equipment maker, we know what operators need (to attract consumers)," he said.

"3G mobile telephony, which features more data services such as video calls and mobile Internet access, helps operators differentiate themselves from each other. And that is offering Huawei a big business opportunity."

Huawei, which last March secured a licence from the Chinese Government to make and sell mobile phones in China, has already customized some handset models for China Unicom, the smaller of the country's two cellular operators.

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