(Yicai) March 1 -- Huawei Technologies invested a lot in the Mobile World Congress this year, as the appearance at the event can be seen as the first move of its comeback to the European market, according to a staffer at the Chinese telecoms giant.

As an industrial exhibition with the opportunity to access global communication industry clients, the MWC is a key event for the full recovery of Huawei's smartphone business in Europe, a Huawei insider told Yicai.

Huawei had the largest booth of its MWC’s pavilion, occupying around 80 percent of one of exhibition hall, an exhibitor from the Middle East told Yicai, adding that Huawei's logo was impossible to miss.

At the MWC this year, the Shenzhen-based company displayed the capabilities of its corporate and terminal businesses and brought its newest products, including the Mate X5 smartphone, which was awarded Best of MWC2024 by foreign media Geekspin and Techaeris.

Operations have basically returned to normal at Huawei, Lu Yong, the company's vice president and president for Europe, said at the WMC. Huawei's global sales revenue is expected to rise over 9 percent to more than EUR90 billion (USD97.4 billion) this year while keeping high research and development expenses, Lu noted, adding that the firm has been present in the European market for 24 years.

Huawei has contributed a total of over EUR12.3 billion to Europe's economy for the last 24 years, Lu Yong added.

Chinese phone brands, including Huawei and Xiaomi, seized a share of almost 40 percent of the European market in 2019, according to data from Counterpoint Research. The figure then started to fall to below 20 percent.

However, research data showed that Huawei's smartphone shipments likely surged 35 percent to 47 percent in the fourth quarter of last year from a year earlier.

Counterpoint Research believes that the artificial intelligence industry will bring more opportunities to Huawei. In fact, the International Data Corporation predicted that 170 million next-generation AI smartphones will be shipped worldwide this year, making up 15 percent of the total.

Editors: Liao Shumin, Futura Costaglione