Why did Xiaomi miss MWC 2015?

Xiaomi and other Chinese smartphone manufacturers “missed” the Mobile World Congress, reflecting their focus on emerging markets and the fact that domestic competition has led to limited promotional budgets.

At the Barcelona Mobile World Congress held this week, the main Chinese companies that participated in the conference included Huawei, ZTE and Lenovo. Lenovo attended the meeting as an American company.

Companies that are not on the list of participants or at least not exhibitors are also worthy of attention, as are emerging smartphone manufacturers such as Xiaomi, Coolpad and Meizu. Cool and Qihoo 360, Meizu and Alibaba recently reached a cooperation.

In order to avoid competition in the domestic market, these companies have recently promoted the export of products. Why hasn't the booth been set up at this conference? It is not entirely accurate to say that they did not participate in the meeting. Many of them have sent representatives' liaison relations and may meet with potential customers outside the meeting.

Meizu said that it sent global sales executives. The Meizu MX4 equipped with the Ubuntu operating system made its debut at the Canonical booth. Xiaomi confirmed that Hugo Barra, head of global sales, will also attend the meeting. Smaller companies may try to save the exhibitor’s high fees and hope to meet potential customers at hotels and other locations outside the venue.

The more fundamental reason is that the international expansion of these enterprises is in developing countries such as Southeast Asia, India, and South America, while the World Mobile Communications Conference is facing a difficult and highly competitive Western market. Hire a strong legal team first.

Huawei, ZTE, and Lenovo have all taken actions to enter the western markets that have more profit but more intense competition. Newcomers have yet to dare to do so. Xiaomi is a small exception. It announced last month that it will launch some mobile phone accessories and wearable devices in the United States, and is actively preparing to introduce some mobile phone accessories in Europe.

After all, each company’s marketing budget is limited, and emerging companies may be saving as much as possible, and thus survive the fierce price war in China.

The reasons for Huawei and ZTE are very good. The two companies are very strong in consumer products and network equipment. Both companies are major sponsors of the conference and are in line with Ericsson, Microsoft and Intel.

Lenovo's participation is not surprising. The company is making great efforts to enter the United States and other Western countries, leveraging on the recent acquisition of Motorola and signing movie star Ashton Kutcher.

Companies such as Xiaomi, Meizu and Coolpad “missed” this meeting at least to show that they are not sure about the European market. This may be a wise move, because except for Xiaomi, these companies have not gone far in the fiercely competitive Western markets.