Latest smartphone rivalry pits Xiaomi against Huawei

Xiaomi CEO Lei Jun recently went online to complain that Huawei has been insulting the Xiaomi Mi4. Huawei CEO Richard Yu went straight to his Huawei Honor team (that is the name of one of the manufacturer's lines and not a description of how virtuous his employees are). The team denied sending out any insulting online messages about Xiaomi's upcoming flagship model.

The Huawei executive said that no one can control the internet, and that each company should concentrate on just doing its best. Xiaomi could be making itself an easy target by offering low priced value models, and then using the controversial flash sales technique to pump up demand. With this marketing method, consumers register their interest in an upcoming phone about to be launched.  Only a small portion of inventory is sold, and sales continue online until the limited number of phones are all gone. This can take as quickly as one second to accomplish. Huawei, on the other hand, used the WeChat messaging app to help sell the Huawei Honor 6. That app has over 400 million members.

Despite Huawei CEO Yu's denial that his firm is insulting Xiaomi, the latter's CEO says that he is gathering evidence, and will present it shortly to Mr. Yu. Considering the number of Apple rivals that were quick to jump on the #bendgate issue to make fun of Apple, it sounds like this type of behavior is just commonplace in a very competitive industry.

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source: RichardYu, GSMInsider