Huawei plans to beat Samsung and Apple in five years

Huawei is currently the third smartphone maker in the world and, considering the first quarter results, they have a long path uphill ahead if they want to beat Samsung. In Q1 2016, Samsung shipped almost 82 million units, followed by Apple with 51.2 million, and Huawei got third place, with 27.5 million handsets shipped. However, Huawei saw an increase of over 30 percent compared to the same period of 2015 while both Apple and Samsung had their shipment numbers go down.

In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Huawei's CEO Richard Yu made things clear by saying "We want to be the No. 1 smartphone, smart-device supplier in the world." When asked how long he thinks that would take, he revealed that the company's plan is to do that in "maybe four or five years."

The company relies on its growth in China and other emerging markets, but they also aim to catch up the current market leaders in the US and Japan. Mr. Yu also added that he hopes Huawei will control more than 20 percent of the global market in five years, but the figure could go even above the 25 percent barrier.

Back in 2015, Huawei shipped 107 million units, while Apple and Samsung managed to reach 232 million and 321 million units shipped. However, all the other manufacturers accounted for no less than 779 million units.