Xiaomi Sales of Smartphones Not So Disappointing

Often called the Apple of China, Xiaomi has revealed disappointing sales numbers for his first six months of the year, but analyst insist the growth for the maker of smartphones is not grinding to a stop.

On Thursday, the company announced that it had sold just over 34.7 million smartphones during the first six months of 2015. Analysts said that if sales were to continue with the same pace the company would miss its sale target of between 80 million and 100 million units for all of 2015.

It comes as Xiaomi, which recently was valued at more than $45 billion, grapples with a number of factors such as the increase of smaller brands that are copying its model of selling phones that are low cost with high specs.

Another issue is the broader slowdown in the smartphone market across China, which shrank by 4% during the first three months of 2015 in comparison to the same three months in 2014. This marked only the first time there has been a year on year market shrinkage in the past six years.

Analysts said it was very crucial for Xiaomi to grow more outside of giant for growth in the future.

The potential of further growth in China has become limited and the company needs to look at emerging markets, said industry analysts.

The company pushed into India this past week announcing the launch of devices in Brazil as well, the first country not in Asia where its devices will be sold.

One analyst said that in both Brazil and India there is strong potential for market expansion, which could give them a significant upside in both locations.

Xiaomi is planning to continue global expansion during 2015 but currently is not selling its smartphones in Europe or the U.S. However, it has attempted to push the brand into the U.S. and Europe through a store online that was opened earlier on 2015 that sells accessories like headphones.

The company is just five years old and owes a great deal of success to how it markets and sells phone through its stores online. The company also has an app store.