At a press conference in Beiging yesterday ZTE announced the launch of the ZTE V965W (also known as Tania) on China Unicom, the country's second biggest network. It is the first Windows Phone device, from a Chinese manufacturer, to launch in its home market. It follows Microsoft's launch of the platform in China earlier this year.

The ZTE Tania has already launched in the UK (on Virgin Mobile) a few other European markets. For its China launch the device's processor is being boosted from 1GHz to 1.4 Ghz, with other specifications (4.3 inch TFT screen, 512MB RAM, 4GB internal memory, 5Mpx camera, 1400 mAH battery) unchanged.

ZTE's Executive Vice President, He Shiyou, said that he expects Windows Phone devices to account for around 10% of its total business this year. For the same period ZTE is targeting total smartphone device sales of more than 30 million. He Shiyou went on to note that the market share of Android devices had almost hit its peak, while Windows devices have been gaining momentum since the fourth quarter of last year and that the launch of ZTE's Windows Phone devices was part of ZTE's overall plan to diversify its product portfolio.

ZTE is currently the fourth biggest mobile phone manufacturer (behind Samsung, Nokia and Apple) having shipped 19.1 million mobile phones in Q1 2012, approximately 4.5 million of which were smartphone devices. 

ZTE is expected to launch additional Windows Phone devices later this year. At the launch of Windows Phone in China the company showed off the ZTE Mimosa, a variant of the ZTE Orbit that was first seen at MWC 2012. Like the Orbit the Mimosa has a 4 inch TFT screen, 800 Mhz Snapdragon processor, 256MB RAM, 4GB of internal memory and a 5 megapixel camera.