The Chinese telecom equipment company says it expects to make a profit of up to 29.4bn yuan ($4.9 billion), compared with 20bn yuan in 2012. This figure was boosted by the success of Huawei’s smartphone division and various cost cutting measures across the business. The firm also said growth in emerging markets helped offset subdued revenues in economies such as US and Australia, where it has faced security concerns.
Cathy Meng, the firm's chief financial officer, said the company was likely to see its business grow further in the coming years amid growing demand for its products. "In the next decade, more people will spend more time using more applications. This will generate more need for data and services, thus increasing the momentum of network and device development."
The firm is also expected to benefit from China's continuing push to improve the telecom infrastructure across the country.
Huawei, which has traditionally concentrated on making telecom network equipment, has also benefited by diversifying into fast-growing sectors such as smartphone manufacturing. The firm specialises in making low-cost phone, which had proved to be a winning strategy.
A key factor behind that success is that in emerging economies such as China and India, mobile phone service providers do not subsidise handsets for subscribers, a trend common in developed markets. That means that consumers have to pay for handsets from their own pockets, making low-cost phones a more affordable option. That has seen Huawei grow to become one of the biggest sellers of smartphones in the world.
