As China is opening its borders and quickly getting back to business after over three years of COVID-19 lockdowns and other curbs, we recently conducted an offline customer-sharing meeting in Shenzhen. It was great to see everyone after a long time and share our insights. The developing trends and China’s premium smartphone market outlook were the most discussed topics.

The country’s smartphone market has become quite saturated. While Chinese OEMs are releasing models with newer technologies, the consumer demand for smartphone upgrades is not as strong as before. Moreover, macroeconomics is another important factor affecting consumers’ purchasing power and confidence. With such a scenario, OEMs are shifting their focus to premium devices to increase their ASPs (average selling prices).

In the latest Mandarin episode of The Counterpoint Podcast, host Rick Cui is joined by Research Analysts Archie Zhang and Shenghao Bai. In this podcast, we touch upon several topics, such as Counterpoint’s prediction for the Chinese smartphone market in 2023, the growing interest of OEMs in releasing foldable smartphones, and more. We also talk about how smartphone makers are focusing on self-developed chips and artificial intelligence (AI) among other areas of differentiation.

Click to listen to the podcast

 You can read the Chinese transcript here and the English transcript here.

Podcast Chapter Markers

01:14: Archie on Counterpoint’s prediction for China’s smartphone market.

02:49: Shenghao on the China smartphone outlook for 2023.

06:24: Archie on the rising ASPs and why OEMs are focusing on premium devices.

08:32: Archie further talks about OEMs’ growing interest in foldable smartphones.

10:40: Shenghao on Counterpoint’s China and global forecasts for foldable smartphones for 2023.

12:16: Archie weighs in on the current innovations in folding smartphones and the room for improvement in the coming generations.

16:35: Shenghao highlights some future development trends for foldable smartphones.

19:42: Almost all flagship smartphones focus big on imaging, but are there other areas for differentiation for OEMs? Shenghao answers.

22:00: Lastly, Archie also shares some insights on self-developed chips, AI, and other developments that smartphone OEMs are focusing on.

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