Shanghai (CNN Business) Huawei's plans to become the world's biggest smartphone brand will have to be put on hold, a senior company executive said, as the company faces increasing pressure from the United States.

Speaking at the CES Asia conference in Shanghai on Tuesday, Shao Yang, the chief strategy officer of Huawei's consumer business, said its smartphone unit had recently become "the second-largest company in terms of sales" and "could have been number one" by the end of this year.

"But now, we have to wait a little bit longer to achieve that," he added, without elaborating further.

Huawei has repeatedly stated its objective to overtake Samsung as the world's biggest seller of smartphones after leapfrogging Apple in shipments last year.

But the Chinese tech giant has for months been on the defensive from a US-led campaign to block its 5G equipment around the world and cut it off from American software and components.

Huawei was on track to overtake Samsung as the world's top smartphone seller by the end of this year, senior executive Shao Yang said.

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