Huawei has a rather BIG agenda for 2019: it wants to beat Apple and Samsung to become the world’s biggest smartphone brand.

Huawei shifted 95 million smartphones during the first half of 2018, up 30% on the previous year, and it is keen to carry on this momentum into 2019 and 2020.

Huawei CEO reckons his company could – and probably will – become the #1 phone seller on the planet by the close of 2019.

Huawei vs. Apple

Huawei controls 27% of its native market in China, which also happens to be the biggest market on the planet.

The company has had a torrid time of it in the US, however, following a ban on its phones in the US.

You can only get them off-contract through channels like Amazon and eBay and GearBest.

This move likely cost Huawei millions of additional sales. And that is a significant number (in a significant market) when you’re trying to beat Apple and Samsung.

Huawei reckons it is on track to shift 200 million phones in 2018, a 31% increase over last year.

Huawei vs The FBI and CIA

The big question right now is whether or not Huawei can get around this issue it has with the FBI and CIA.

AT&T and Verizon both pulled out of massively lucrative deals with Huawei last year, effectively costing the Chinese company millions in additional revenue.

And this issue is not likely to change anytime soon.

With this in mind, it is hard to see how Huawei could possibly beat Apple or Samsung without decent penetration in the US, which is one of the biggest consumer markets on the planet.

There are plenty of other regions where Huawei could pick up the shortfall, places like India and other emerging countries, have millions of untapped users.

And Huawei makes phones of all shapes and sizes. In this respect, it’s business model is more akin to Samsung’s than Apple.

Apple’s bottom line, it seems, is just the yardstick Huawei is now measuring itself against.