A flagship store of Xiaomi in Beijing, capital city of China Photo: VCG

Lei Jun, founder and CEO of Chinese electronics giant Xiaomi, said on Tuesday that the company will aim to surpass Apple and vowed to make Xiaomi the world's biggest smartphone maker in the next three years.

His remarks came at the launch of the Xiaomi 12 series which include the Xiaomi 12X, Xiaomi 12 and Xiaomi12 Pro.

"Xiaomi is formally eyeing Apple, learning from Apple, and then, will surpass Apple step by step in the future." Lei said.

Starting from February 2020, Xiaomi vowed to enter the high-end market of smartphones. Since the beginning of this year, Xiaomi has released a number of high-end flagship phones, such as its 11Ultra.

However, in terms of market performance, there is still a big gap between its current high-end mobile phones and Apple's. 

Industry data show that between January and August this year, Apple's share of high-end smartphones above 5,000 yuan ($785) in the Chinese market reached 67 percent. 

In October, with the introduction of new products, the sales of Apple's iPhone rose sharply on both month-on-month and year-on-year basis, which stimulated the weak mobile phone market.

Data from Xiaomi showed that in the second quarter of this year, the company became the second largest smartphone manufacturer in the world. In the European market, Xiaomi successfully surpassed Samsung and Apple, reaching a market share of 25.3 percent. 

Lei said on Tuesday that Xiaomi will increase its R&D investment in the next five years to 100 billion yuan ($15.7 billion), which is double the original plan.