100 million shipments in 10 months - The numbers behind Xiaomi's remarkable growth

Xiaomi has successfully completed its ambitious annual shipments target for 2018. Several months ago, the Chinese phone maker declared its intentions to ship a total of 100 million devices before the year-end. According to Mydrivers News, the goal was achieved at 11:23 PM on October 26, which is a little over 2 months ahead of schedule.

Lei Jun, the founder of Xiaomi, announced the news at the Zhong Guan Cun technology hub in Beijing on November 2. The area, which is known as China's Silicon Valley, is where the company was established back in 2010. 

Given that Xiaomi is currently shipping an average of 10 million devices per month, it's possible that the manufacturer could easily reach 120 million units by the end of the year. This is no small feat, especially given the fact that the global smartphone market is now considered “effectively in a recession”. Of course, there's still a while to go before the firm reaches the shipment numbers of heavyweights like Samsung, Apple, and Huawei. Still, the latest data shows that Xiaomi is the 4th largest OEM in the world and second in terms of growth.

The most likely reason for the company's success is that it produces smartphones that are cheap and with respectable build quality. The brand has been incredibly popular in China and India, where demand for handsets is ever-booming. We also have to note that Xiaomi has been an innovator in the smartphone space. Its original Mi Mix model was a handset that was among the first to spur the all-screen craze we're observing today and the latest Mi Mix 3 might shake things up again in 2019 with its interesting sliding screen mechanism.