Chinese smartphone vendor Huawei is the first to ship around more than 100 million handsets in a year, which is great for the company. Its 2015 shipments jumped to 44 percent and defied a market slowdown due to its very strong sales within China and in the Western Europe.

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The Shenzhen-based manufacturer revealed Wednesday its shipment of 108 million smartphones in 2015. It aimed to be a budget supplier company that targets higher margin premium models. To compare, the global industry should have grown a single digit rate last year for the very first time.

The company's overall performance comes timely when industry leaders such as Apple and Samsung are faced with a potentially tough year ahead.

Samsung admits a challenging business environment in 2016 especially with the heightened competition and a weak global economy. As per Nikkei reports, Apple expects a cut in production for its latest iPhone models by about 30 percent in the first quarter of the year due to mounting inventories.

Chinese smartphone makers are edging for a stiffer competition in the smartphone business especially that consumers are now price conscious and searching for cheaper options with similar features and frills.

Analysts say that no one can really determine whether Huawei can be a tough contender for Apple and Samsung as Lenovo Group  and Xiaomi are swapping now and then in rankings in terms of prices. They say that Huawei is after Xiaomi and all other smaller Android makers.

In the global smartphone market, Huawei stands third with a market share of 7.5 percent in the 3^rd quarter, after Apple's 13.5 percent and Samsung's 23.8percent, as per research firm IDC.

According to Huawei, revenues from consumer business groups jumped 70 percent year-on-year to $20 billion in 2015 for selling products like tablets and smartphones.