<News Alert> China handset shipments resumed growth in May 2023 due to the early launch of new handset models
- China’s handset shipments increased 25% y-o-y to 26m units, mainly due to the early launch of new handset models in April and May
- We expect the shipment growth momentum to continue throughout June and July and believe shipments will return to single-digit growth in 3Q, when the number of new models launched normalises
- May shipments better than expected. We maintain our forecast that smartphone shipments will resume growth in 2H23, and expect supply chain players like Sunny Optical (2382 HK) and vendors like Xiaomi (1810 HK) to benefit
Launch of new models drives handset shipment growth. China’s handset shipments increased by 25.2% y-o-y to 26.0m units in May, according to the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology’s announcement yesterday. 5G handset shipments grew by 13.7% y-o-y to 20.2m units, which accounted for 77.5% of total handset shipments. Meanwhile, handset shipments for 5M23 decreased slightly by 0.7% y-o-y to 108m units. The rebound in May was mainly due to the early launch of 89 new handset models in April and May 2023, a y-o-y increase of 41.1%.
We expect the momentum of shipment growth to continue throughout June and July. May shipments came in better than market expectations. However, we believe shipments will return to single-digit growth in 3Q, when the number of new models launched normalises. The rebound, driven by the launch of new products, reaffirms our view that customer sentiment towards smartphones is improving. We maintain our forecast that smartphone shipments will resume growth in 2H23. We predict that smartphone supply chain players like Sunny Optical (2382 HK) and smartphone vendors like Xiaomi (1810 HK) will benefit from the recovery of smartphone shipments.
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