‘Tron’ is a cool, if slightly scary, name for a video-game console. It is also a 1982 Disney film about being trapped in a virtual world. This has not stopped Huawei from launching a gaming device by that name in China, its home market, in 2014. Telecoms equipment is, however, a much larger business for this ambitious, unlisted, employee-owned company, founded by an ex-military engineer. Investors in the sector’s other big players are, increasingly, trapped in Huawei’s world.

Cheap consoles will help build Huawei’s brand now that it is shaking up consumer electronics in emerging markets, led by increasing sales of cheap smartphones. Revealing its 2013 results on Tuesday, the company said it planned to shift 80m units this year – 30m more than last year. Selling kit to carrier networks still accounted for three-quarters or so of its $40bn in revenues last year, growing decently from 2012 levels.

That should spook investors in Cisco, Alcatel-Lucent or Ericsson – for two reasons. First, whatever it was that battered Cisco’s business in several emerging markets towards the end of 2013, it did no harm to Huawei. Potential Cisco customers might be put off by the revelations about US spies snooping via private hardware and be less worried than western politicians about China peeking down Huawei’s wires. But it is more likely that Huawei is simply beating the western companies in emerging markets, just as big opportunities there (the transition to 4G) come up for grabs.