Feixiang Network News (Gao Jingyu / Wen) 2021 is still difficult for the mobile phone industry, on the one hand, due to the impact of the global new crown epidemic, which has brought a huge impact on the mobile phone market and supply chain. On the other hand, with the gradual saturation of the smart phone market, the domestic mobile phone market has completely entered the stock market, and at the same time, with the decline in the demand for user replacement, the mobile phone industry has encountered a bottleneck period of development.
Recently, data released by IDC shows that global smartphone shipments in the third quarter of this year were 330 million units, down 6.7% year-on-year. According to data from the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, in the first half of this year, the shipment volume of the domestic mobile phone market was 174 million units, an increase of 13.7% year-on-year, and the mobile phone shipments in the domestic market in the third quarter of this year were more than 74 million units, an increase of 2.6% year-on-year, of which 5G mobile phone shipments accounted for about three-quarters of the total mobile phone shipments.
From these data, it can be seen that the mobile phone market ushered in a brief outbreak in the first half of 2021, and the demand suppressed by the epidemic in 2020 was released centrally, but with the end of this wave of replacement tide, the pace of overall market demand gradually slowed down, and the overall mobile phone market was still in a downward trend.
For mobile phone manufacturers, when the growth of the mobile phone market slows down and the dividend retreats, technological innovation around improving user experience is still an important direction to stimulate the demand for replacement. Therefore, this year, the mobile phone industry has opened a new round of technological "arms race", and it has become a new highland for the competition game of head manufacturers.
Mobile phone chips have entered the 4nm era
As we all know, chips are the core hardware that supports the performance of a smartphone. At the end of this year, chip manufacturers began to compete in advanced processes, shortly after MediaTek launched the 5G flagship chip Tianji 9000, chip manufacturer Qualcomm recently released a chip product using 4nm process technology - Snapdragon 8 Gen1. This means that mobile phone chips have officially entered the 4nm era.
With the launch of Qualcomm and MediaTek flagship chips, the starting gun released by the new Android flagship at the end of the year was launched. For the Android camp, Qualcomm and MediaTek's 4nm chips are a major positive and will provide confidence for mobile phone manufacturers to further seize the high-end market. At present, there are more than dozens of mobile phone manufacturers cooperating with the Snapdragon 8 Gen1 platform, including Xiaomi, vivo, OPPO, Honor, OnePlus, ZTE, Black Shark, Motorola, etc., and the first commercial terminal moto edge X30 was also listed in December this year.
MediaTek is currently the second largest 5G chip manufacturer after Qualcomm, with the latest 4nm process technology, as well as the strong layout of Xiaomi, OV, Redmi, Realme, Honor and other terminal manufacturers, MediaTek and Qualcomm in the high-end chip market to compete head-on.
Folding screen mobile phone track welcomes a new round of competition
It has been three years since the world's first folding screen mobile phone was launched, and manufacturers such as Samsung, Huawei, Motorola, Xiaomi, and Royole have entered the market, so that the smart phone form that has originally reached the "exhaustion of mountains and rivers" ushered in the moment of willow and dark flowers.
"Folding screen" mobile phones are generally considered to be the trend of the future development of the mobile phone industry. From the experience point of view, the benefits brought by the folding screen design are beyond doubt, when the screen is turned on, the mobile phone transforms into a tablet, bringing a larger screen visual experience. And when you close the screen, you can turn into a traditional mobile phone and easily tuck it into your pocket. With the advent of the 5G era, mobile phones are more focused on office and entertainment attributes, and in the case that the screen size of single-screen mobile phones has reached the limit, the advantages of folding screens in screen size are becoming more prominent.
The popularity speed of folding screen mobile phones is also beyond people's imagination. On December 2, according to a latest research report released by the screen agency DSCC, in the third quarter of this year, the total shipment of folding screen mobile phones increased by 215% month-on-month and 480% year-on-year. According to DSCC's estimates, the shipment of folding screen mobile phones next year is expected to be close to 20 million.
However, the development of folding screen mobile phones is still faltering. Due to the screen yield, hinge technology, and high price, it has become an important factor that plagues the popularity of folding screen mobile phones, but it still does not prevent the head manufacturers in major industries from continuing to invest in this technology and constantly exploring and innovating.
On December 15, OPPO officially released a new folding flagship OPPO Find N, the outer screen adopts a 5.49-inch screen with a ratio of 18:9, and after unfolding, it is a 7.1-inch horizontal screen with a ratio of 8.4:9, with the self-developed Seiko pseudo-vertebral hinge, it realizes the folding effect of seamless concealment and the new interactive experience of free hovering, and brings a new system interaction.
Huawei also brought the annual flagship folding screen mobile phone HUAWEI P50 Pocket, which adopts the design of top and bottom folding, with a new generation of water drop hinge and multi-dimensional linkage lifting technology to achieve seamless folding. The product adopts a 6.9-inch immersive large screen, 21:9 screen ratio, no need to expand the mobile phone, through the smart external screen, you can easily get the desired information and services.
Xiaomi has also shown great enthusiasm for folding screen mobile phones, Xiaomi's new folding screen mobile phone MIX Fold 2 is under development, and revealed that this phone will use a full-height brush internal and external screen configuration, redesigned a new hinge structure, the processor is Snapdragon 8 Gen1, is expected to be released in the third quarter of next year.
In addition, Vivo's first folding screen mobile phone has also entered the agenda, and the news said that this product is composed of an 8-inch main screen and a 6.5-inch external screen, of which the inner screen is provided by Samsung, and the outer screen is from BOE.
It can be seen that domestic mobile phone manufacturers are competing to enter the new track of folding screen mobile phones, and the folding screen mobile phone market is expected to usher in a new round of concentrated outbreak next year.
The off-screen camera is still in the commercial testing period
Although the under-screen camera technology has always been considered to be the ultimate evolution path to achieve a full screen, so far, the user side has not really ushered in large-scale commercial popularization.
In fact, the head mobile phone manufacturers have long been into their own arsenal of under-screen camera technology, in 2019, OPPO and Xiaomi exposed the engineering machine based on under-screen camera technology. In February last year, Vivo launched its own exploratory concept product vivo APEX 2020, which is also the first under-screen camera technology landing product.
Until the second half of 2021, the under-screen camera products ushered in a real outbreak, ZTE launched a new generation of Axon 30 5G, Xiaomi, Samsung respectively launched MIX4, Galaxy Z Fold 3, OPPO, vivo screen camera mobile phone plans to launch a mobile phone equipped with off-screen camera technology.
However, at present, the under-screen camera technology is still in the stage of continuous technological evolution, and some technical pain points still need to be further solved, for example, the current under-screen camera mobile phone is not perfect at any time, such as the "screen window effect" in the high-brightness environment; even if the compensation algorithm is used, the front-shot imaging effect also lacks some details, and users who have super high requirements for mobile phones may care about these problems. Therefore, although a number of manufacturers have begun to commercialize, it will take some time before the industry really explodes, and it is believed that as the technology further matures, more manufacturers will pour into the off-screen camera track.