China’s Mobile Phone Exports to US Way Up, Exports to Africa Way Down

China makes an awful lot of mobile phones. Most of those phones are exported and sold elsewhere. So who is China’s biggest mobile customer? According to some new data released by the Chinese government, the United States is the biggest importer of Chinese phones, and its numbers are going up. In the first half of this year, China exported 42.2 million mobiles to the United States. That’s a 21.3 percent increase over the corresponding period last year, and it brought in over $6.7 billion, a more than eighty-percent jump from last year.

But the US is still only nine percent of China’s total mobile phone market, and exports elsewhere are down. Exports from China to ASEAN countries and Latin America saw modest slides, but China’s Africa export numbers fell off a cliff. Compared to the same period last year, mobile phone exports to Africa are down 26.6 percent.

It’s not clear what caused this drop, but one theory is a drop in interest in China’s shanzhai — i.e. knockoff — phones, which accounted for a significant percentage of China’s mobile phone exports to Africa. In China, of course, shanzhai phones are being replaced by low-cost branded smartphones like Xiaomi’s M1. But most of those phones are only available domestically, meaning that if African consumers want to move away from Chinese knockoff brands to branded mobiles in the same price range, they’re likely to be seeing more options from countries other than China.

Whether or not this is bad news depends on whether or not you’re a Chinese mobile phone exporter. But it is a sign that some foreign markets could be ready for China’s cheap smartphones. There are already signs that Xiaomi is looking to expand beyond China; how soon will other mobile brands follow suit?

[via Sina Tech, image source]