Microsoft wants to dominate the smartphone market, not in the United States, but in China, which research firms said will take the spot as the biggest smartphone market in the world this year.

According to research company IDC, up to 137 million new units will flood the Chinese market in 2012 and Microsoft has been working hard to ship as many as smartphones that run its Windows Phone 7.5 mobile platform.

At present, Chinese mobile phone owners have been purchasing Android-based smartphones in record quantities that Bloomberg said the platform will sustain its edge in China by the end of the year, brandishing a market share of about 70 percent.

Android's success formula? Vendors using the Google-owned mobile OS sell phone units cheap while maintaining at the same time the essential features that made the smartphone a global hit - internet connectivity, multimedia functions and gaming pleasures.

In most cases, Android phones sport styles that Chinese consumers have accepted as good enough for their reasonable prices as against the expensive iPhones that carry four-times as much price of a mid-level Android-powered smartphone.

On Wednesday, Microsoft made known its aim to capitalise on the existing smartphone competition environment in China by issuing phone units that could retail as low as $US158, way too affordable compared to Apple's iPhone, which is expected to finish the year with a 12 percent hold on the Chinese market.

Microsoft chief for Greater China Simon Leung said in a news briefing that that company has laid out the strategies that would catapult Microsoft-powered phones to the top spot in the lucrative market in the years ahead.

"We will continue to drive the price down ... Our goal is number one. Having a goal to be number two is not really a goal," Leung was reported by Bloomberg as saying.

Leung, however, has not divulged a specific time-frame for the company goal to be realised.

And with vendors, which includes Samsung, Nokia, HTC and ZTE, apparently committed to issue Windows phones not exceeding the $158-mark, experts believe that its would only take a few years for Microsoft to realise its target in the region.

By 2013, Windows smartphones are forecasted to replace iPhones as number two in China, securing by that time market share of 15 percent as against to Apple's 13 percent, Bloomberg wrote.

The top spot remains with Android at about 66 percent market dominance.

IDC analyst Teck-Zhung Wong told Bloomberg that Windows phone will certainly enjoy advantages over Apple's smartphone as Microsoft can deploy the mobile OS to many more vendors, which would translate for the system the availability of more devices in various brands.

"Windows Phone will have a lot of equipment manufacturing partners and more device choice at more different price points," Wong said.

Over the next four years, Microsoft's advantages and strategies will lead to increased market share of 20 percent, right in the middle of Google's 60 percent and Apple's 16 percent, Wong added.