Chinese production of mobile phones from will suffer a double-digit decline this year, says the National Bureau of Statistics of China.

In 1Q 2020, China mobile phone production declined 50% from 4Q 2019 and dropped 33% from a year earlier. Many factories were temporarily closed.

Production has since recovered with 2Q 2020 units up 36% from 1Q and 3Q 2020 units up 15% from 2Q. However even if production in 4Q 2020 returns to the 4Q 2019 peak of 517 million units, total 2020 production would be 1525 million units, down 15% from 2019..

Mobile phones include both smartphones and feature phones. Smartphones account for about 75% of total mobile phone units.

The smartphone market decline in 2020 will not be as severe as the overall mobile phone decline. Recent forecasts call for a smartphone unit decline of about 10% to 11%.

The outlook for Chinese production of microcomputer units is much stronger than the outlook for mobile phones. In 1Q 2020 China production of microcomputers dropped 42% from 4Q 2019 and was down 15% from a year earlier.

However, production bounced back strongly in 2Q 2020, up 72% from 1Q 2020 and up 17% from a year earlier. Based on data through 3Q 2020 the Semiconductor Intelligence forecast for 4Q 2020, microcomputer production will be up 8% in 2020 over 2019.

The definition of microcomputers in the China production data is uncertain, but it likely is a combination of PCs and tablets. China microcomputer production in 2019 was 338 million units. IDC estimated 2019 shipments of PCs were 266 million units and tablets were 143 million units, for a total of 410 million units. The China microcomputer production is 83% of the combined PC and tablet shipments.

The China production data is consistent with overall trends in electronics in 2020. Demand for PCs and tablets has increased in 2020 as the pandemic has forced many people to work from home, learn from home, and even communicate socially from home.

Many households without PCs or tablets have needed to acquire them, often subsidized by employers or schools. Other households have upgraded their PCs or tablets.