Apple's Singles Day Sales Fall Short as Huawei and Xiaomi Surge

Apple's sales fell short of Chinese rivals Huawei and Xiaomi during China's Singles Day shopping festival, with unit sales declining 4% year-on-year. In contrast, Huawei saw a 66% increase and Xiaomi a 28% increase. This contributed to a 5% overall rise in Chinese smartphone sales.

Apple's iPhone 15 starts at 5,999 yuan ($832), while Huawei's Mate 60 and Xiaomi's Mi 14 start at 5,499 yuan ($763) and 3,999 yuan ($555), respectively.

Chinese e-commerce platforms no longer release Singles Day sales figures, but JD.com said Apple product transactions surpassed 10 billion yuan ($1.39 billion) on its platform. Xiaomi's cumulative gross merchandise value exceeded 22.4 billion yuan during the festival.

Analysts expect China's smartphone market to rebound, with IDC forecasting year-on-year growth in the fourth quarter after ten consecutive quarters of decline.

Apple's sluggish performance is attributed to supply chain issues that have constrained the availability of its new iPhone 15 models. Counterpoint analyst Ivan Lam expects the situation to normalize soon.