Sony’s success in image sensors has been well documented recently, the company holds over 40% of the market and supplies camera tech to many of its smartphone rivals. Not many in China though, something the Japanese giant is hoping to change as it continues to shift the focus of its business to imaging technology and away from hardware.

China is arguably the most important smartphone market right now, home to a mature economy but still an emerging market of sorts. Like other companies (for different reasons), Sony is looking to tap into China. At the moment the company provides components for Xiaomi’s high end handset cameras, but Sony wants to branch to other major Chinese brands like Lenovo, ZTE, and Meizu, and provide for their portfolios.

Tomoyuki Suzuki, chief of Sony's device solutions business, said that the company is going to increase sales of imaging tech to 50 billion yen (around $4 billion USD) during 2015. He added that the company will now be looking to increase partnerships with Chinese smartphone manufacturers to use Sony's image tech.