(Yicai) March 12 -- Apple will open another store in Shanghai at the end of this month, increase the size of its laboratory in Shanghai and build a new lab in Shenzhen as the US tech giant battles to retain market share in the country amid fierce competition.

Apple will open its eighth Apple Store in downtown Shanghai on March 21, the Cupertino-based company said yesterday.

It will expand its lab in Shanghai to improve its research and development abilities in the city, the firm said on its website today. And later in the year it will build a new lab in Shenzhen to deepen ties with suppliers in the city, as well as enhance the firm’s testing and R&D capabilities of the iPhone, iPad, Apple Vision Pro and other products, it added.

Apple has invested over CNY1 billion (USD139.4 million) in advanced applied research labs, and this figure will continue to rise thanks to the new lab in Shenzhen, it said.

China is one of Apple’s most important markets. The iPhone accounted for 17.3 percent of smartphone sales in China last year, ranking first for the first time, according to data from US research institute IDC.

But in the first six weeks of this year, iPhone sales plunged 24 percent year on year, while shipments from rival Huawei, which rolled out a number of new 5G smartphones in the second half last year, soared 64 percent, according to the latest data from market research firm Counterpoint Research. Over the period, smartphone sales in the country sank 7 percent.

More than 95 percent of Apple products are made and assembled in China. Chinese companies’ share of iPhone electronics production will rise to 24 percent by 2025 from 7 percent in 2022, US financial services firm J.P. Morgan Chase said.

Editor: Kim Taylor