Huawei is expected to lead smartphone vendors with the highest shipment growth rate in 2016 as other brands including Samsung Electronics, Apple and Xiaomi are likely to see their shipments stay flat or even decline on year, according to industry sources.

Huawei shipped 108 million smartphones globally in 2015, growing 44% from 75 million shipped a year earlier, and the sources expect its shipments to continue growing more than 20% on year to 120 million units in 2016.

Samsung shipped about 320 million smartphones in 2015, down slightly from a year earlier, which was the company's first ever on-year decline. Shipments of the Galaxy S6-series products and Galaxy Note 5 reached about 40 million and 10 million units, respectively, in 2015, which were lower than market expectations.

While Samsung is expected to ramp up its shipments of mid-range models and to strengthen its deployments in emerging markets in 2016, its shipments are expected to stay flat in the year, said the sources.

Meanwhile, the sources are conservative about the prospects of iPhone shipments in 2016, estimating total iPhone device shipments to reach 220 million in 2016, down 5% from a year earlier.

Xiaomi shipped 70 smartphones in 2015, falling short of its target of 80 million units. Xiaomi's smartphone shipments are unlikely to hit a new high in 2016 as the vendor has indicated that it will focus on ramping up the core competitiveness of smartphones rather than pushing up shipment volumes.