Why are most of the mobile phones sold around the world made in China, South Korea and the United States? Don’t other countries make mobile phones?

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According to the global mobile phone sales data for the third quarter of 2021 recently released by market research firm Canalys, the data shows that Samsung once again became the leading supplier, with shipments of 69.4 million units, accounting for 21% of the market share. Apple ranked second, with shipments of 49.2 million units, an increase of 14%. Xiaomi ranked third, with shipments of 44 million units, reaching a market share of 14%. OPPO and vivo ranked fourth and fifth, respectively, with shipments of 36.7 million units and 34.2 million units, respectively. Huawei, once the world's second, has fallen out of the top five. From the perspective of the global market, the world's best-selling mobile phones are currently concentrated in South Korea (Samsung, LG), the United States (Apple) and China (Xiaomi, OPPO, vivo, Huawei, Transsion, OnePlus, Realme, etc.). It seems that other countries in the world no longer make mobile phones. Is this really the case?

Obviously, the answer is not what we thought. In fact, most major countries in the world now basically have their own mobile phone brands, but most of them have not been able to go abroad and go to the world, so many people do not know about them. This is the same as the domestic market more than ten years ago. At that time, China was not without its own mobile phones (such as Bird, Haier, TCL, Coolpad, etc.), but we could not even defend our own market, let alone go abroad. As shown in the figure below, in the domestic mobile phone market in 2007, Nokia occupied nearly half of the market, Sony Ericsson, Motorola and Samsung occupied more than one-third of the market. More than 85% of the domestic market is occupied by foreign mobile phones, and domestic mobile phones can only occupy a little bit of the low-end market.

Therefore, more than ten years ago, if you went to European countries, the United States, Southeast Asia, and South American countries, others would also think that the Chinese did not make mobile phones, because there were no Chinese mobile phones on the market at all. It seemed that only Finland (Nokia), Japan (Sony Ericsson) and the United States (Motorola) were making mobile phones in the world.

The rise of domestic products

Nowadays, we feel that only China, South Korea, and the United States are making mobile phones. This can only be said to be the rise of domestic products, which have gone abroad and dominated the global market. It is difficult for other countries to compete with China, the United States, and South Korea. As mentioned at the beginning, the top five manufacturers have occupied 72% of the global market. If Huawei and Transsion (which occupies most of the entire African market), OnePlus (focusing on overseas markets), and South Korea's LG are included, then China, the United States, and South Korea occupy at least 85% of the global mobile phone market. Mobile phone manufacturers in other countries cannot compete with the mobile phones of China, South Korea, and the United States, and have not been able to go global, so they are not well known. After more than a decade of changes, only the United States has not left the table, and Finland and Japan have been replaced by China and South Korea. It has to be said that domestic products are really rising slowly!

Mobile phone brands from other countries

Although mobile phones from other countries have not gone global, many of them still have a certain market in their own countries. For example, as a dominant country in the past, although Japanese mobile phones have declined globally, Sony, Sharp, Kyocera, and Fujitsu still occupy more than 30% of the domestic market share. Another example is France, one of the European powers, which also has two relatively well-known mobile phone brands, Alcatel and Wiko. Alcatel was once glorious for a short period of time, but now these two brands have been basically abandoned by their own people. The French domestic market is now basically divided up by China, South Korea, and the United States.

Summarize

The major countries in the world all have their own brands to a greater or lesser extent. For example, India also has its own mobile phone brands Micromax, Karbonn Mobiles, Lava, etc. However, the mobile phones in these countries are not very competitive. Just like the situation in our country’s mobile phone market more than a decade ago, their own brands can only occupy a small part of the low-end market, not to mention going abroad. This is why we feel that only China, South Korea and the United States are selling mobile phones in the world.