Is Xiaomi, famously dubbed as the “Apple of China,” the world’s leading innovator in mobile today? A story by Juan Pablo Vazquez Sampere on the Harvard Business Review blog makes the case, it’s aptly titled “Xiaomi, Not Apple, Is Changing the Smartphone Market.”

“Xiaomi, the four-year-old Chinese smartphone manufacturer, has found just such a sweet spot, and as a result is taking the smartphone industry by a storm,” writes Sampere.

The writer notes that Xiaomi has effectively targeted China’s emerging middle-class, who are able enough to buy premium goods, but not yet at premium prices. Although the Chinese company has been accused on borrowing too generously from Apple’s playbook, it’s record of having products that rank the best in the industry in terms of performance is worth noting. Not to mention, it’s massive growth and sales-record setting publicity tactics have enchanted both industry watchers and consumers alike.

Sampere describes Xiaomi’s move as “disruptive” noting that the company does not target premium customers but mostly teens buying high-quality phones. By keeping its manufacturing costs low, keeping each model on the market longer, and only charging a little higher than the manufacturing costs of each handset to give a competitive price, Xiaomi has found a nice where it’s making a killing in both revenue and profits.

Aside from its quality handsets at low price, Xiaomi has also made a habit of attracting enormous publicity for its sales, which it conducts through online channels, thus saving overhead on flagship stores. It also sells its unit by batch, thus, giving that sense of exclusivity to status-conscious buyers who wants to get the “limited set” of many things.

Xiaomi is also innovating on its manufacturing process, doing something weekly that some handset makers can only do every year or on every new model it introduces. In an October 2013 story by Parmy Olson in Forbes Magazine, the writer describes how Xiaomi updates its handsets.

“Xiaomi, the hot smartphone maker from China which recently overtook Apple in marketshare there, wants to do for hardware what developers do to software: change it. All the time.”

“It’s part of the unique way that Xiaomi operates, closely analyzing the user feedback it gets on its smartphones and following the suggestions it likes for the next batch of 100,000 phones. It releases them every Tuesday at noon Beijing time.”

The process makes each batch “incrementally better,” as ex-Googler turned Xiaomi exec Hugo Barra puts it.

The company has announced its plans of expanding in up to 10 countries this year and has also remarked that it will prepare its devices for the US market in 2015. It currently aims to sell 60 million handsets in 2014 and up to 100 million next year. Xiaomi has also just become the 5th largets smartphone maker in the world in July.

If the company continues with its momentum, the “Apple of China” may simply be labeled as the leading handset maker in the industry.