A major smartphone company has decided to suspend production of its line of foldable devices. This is evidenced by reports from China.
Ma Guangyu from 163.com reported that the growth of the foldable smartphone market in China this year at 13.6% was below expectations, and at least one company believes that under such conditions it has become too difficult to maintain profitability. The source does not name the company that is canceling its plans to launch foldable smartphones in 2025. However, Oppo and vivo — are the two companies that have the longest period since the previous such device was released.
Xiaomi only recently launched its foldable Mix Flip internationally after announcing it along with the Mix Fold 4 in July. However, according to the report, the production of the Mix Flip did not reach the planned 500 thousand units, stopping at 460 thousand, and sales of the Mix Fold 4 did not even reach 100 thousand units.
Oppo has not released a new foldable device for more than a year — Find N3 was released in October 2023. As for vivo, the company has not released a successor to the X Flip, which debuted in early 2023. However, it did announce two horizontal folding smartphones — the X Fold3 and Fold3 Pro, with the Pro being its first foldable device on the international market.
Transsion’s brands, Tecno and Infinix, have recently introduced their own new products: Tecno Phantom V Fold2, V Flip2, and Infinix Zero Flip. So it is unlikely that they will make such radical decisions soon after the official premieres.
According to IDC, 2.23 million foldable devices were shipped in China in the third quarter of 2024, which corresponds to an increase of 13.6% compared to the same period last year. This is the lowest figure in the last two years.
Source: gsmarena