Apple suffered a serious setback in shipments of iPhone devices in the China market in the first quarter of 2017 as China-based brands including Huawei, Oppo and Vivo managed to continue ramping up their shipments, according to data released by IDC.

Apple saw its iPhone shipments in China slide 26.7% on year to 9.6 million units in the first quarter, accounting for a 9.2% share compared to 11% of a quarter earlier and 12.7% of a year earlier, the data showed.

Echoing the data, Apple revenues generated from the China market declined 12% on year to US$16.2 billion in the January-March period, according to Apple's latest financial report.

However, Huawei managed to ramp up its shipments by 25.5% on year to 20.8 million units in the first quarter and reclaimed the top-vendor position from the local rival Oppo. Huawei also saw its share climb to 20% in the quarter, up from 16.8% a quarter earlier and 16% a year earlier, IDC said.

Oppo ranked second with shipments totaling 18.9 million units for an 18.2% share, while Vivo shipped 14.6 million and took third position with a 14.1% share.

Huawei has established more than 1,000 experience shops in core cities in China recently to counter the established channels set up by Oppo and Vivo, according to sources from Taiwan's handset supply chain. Huawei also aims to set up over 15,000 retail shops globally, the sources added.

Oppo currently has a total of over 200,000 online and offline sales outlets in China, while Vivo has 250,000 offline sales outlets, indicated the sources.

Overall, 104.1 million smartphones were shipped to the China market in the first quarter of 2017, representing a mere 1% on-year growth, IDC said.