On December 28, at the Xiaomi 12 new product launch, Lei Jun, founder, chairman and general manager of Xiaomi, reiterated that Xiaomi will officially benchmark Apple and surpass Apple step by step in the future. In addition, Xiaomi has also updated its research and development plan, and the company's R& D investment will be increased to 100 billion yuan in the next 5 years. In fact, at the beginning of 2020, Xiaomi announced a five-year investment of 50 billion yuan in research and development plans, and Xiaomi's financial report showed that Xiaomi invested 9.3 billion yuan in research and development in 2020, accounting for 3.78% of the annual revenue, and did not achieve the "more than 10 billion yuan" promised by Lei Jun. In recent years, how much has Xiaomi invested in research and development? Is it a high investment? Actuarial Lion takes you to see.
Benchmarking Apple, courage and gaps
Xiaomi's "bold words" against Apple were put forward a week ago. On December 21, Lei Jun announced on his personal Weibo that "Xiaomi's high-end mobile phones have officially begun to benchmark Apple and learn from Apple." The news soon appeared on Weibo's hot search, which was hotly discussed by netizens. Lei Jun said, "Domestic mobile phones should have such courage, why not compare it?" In comparison, you may find that the strength of domestic mobile phones is much stronger than everyone thinks. ”
Benchmarking Apple, where does Xiaomi come from? Since its establishment in 2010, Xiaomi has attacked all the way and become one of the protagonists of the mobile phone market. In 2020, Xiaomi released Xiaomi Mi 10, officially entering the high-end. In the second quarter of this year, Xiaomi surpassed Apple for the first time to become the world's second largest mobile phone brand, second only to Samsung, with a global share of 17%. Therefore, on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of Xiaomi's mobile phone, Lei Jun set a new goal, "within three years, win the world's first." "It's not easy for us because the competitors are very strong," he said. But to surpass these tech giants, surpassing in sales is the first step. ”
However, this is no easy task. Xiaomi's mobile phone shipments last year were 146 million units, and this year's target is about 200 million units. At present, the annual shipment volume of Samsung, the world's first smartphone, is about 260 million units. According to market research firm Canalys, Xiaomi's global market share in the third quarter was 13.5%, slipping to third place. In this regard, Xiaomi executives explained that it is mainly related to the strong performance of the iPhone 13 after the release of new products.
The second step for Xiaomi to surpass the giants is Lei Jun's product strategy that spoiled on Weibo a week ago. "We have decided to officially benchmark Apple in terms of products and experiences, learn from Apple, and surpass Apple step by step in the coming period." It is based on this strategy that Xiaomi has formulated a product strategy of the Xiaomi Mi 12 dual-size dual flagship, "one large and one small, respectively, benchmarking the iPhone13 and iPhone13 Pro Max." ”
But the gap between Xiaomi and Apple still needs time to make up. According to the corporate financial report, the comprehensive gross profit margin of Xiaomi in the third quarter was 18.3%, and the gross profit margin of the smartphone business was 12.8%; the overall gross profit margin of Apple in the third quarter was 42.2%, of which the gross profit margin of various hardware products such as iPhone, iPad, and Mac was 34.3%. Compared with Apple, the gross profit margin of Xiaomi mobile phones is still at a low level.
Technology-based, is there enough investment in research and development?
"This year is probably the year I've been criticized the most by users. After experiencing these tribulations and pains, I am more convinced of the iron law of Xiaomi - technology-oriented. At the new product launch, Lei Jun said so.
Two years ago, Xiaomi announced a five-year research and development plan that it plans to invest 50 billion yuan in the next five years, and as of now, Xiaomi's research and development investment has exceeded 22 billion yuan, and the number of engineers has exceeded 16,000. At the press conference on the 28th, Lei Jun announced the renewal of the research and development plan: the R & D investment in the next 5 years will be doubled to 100 billion yuan. However, Nandu Big Data Research Institute combed the xiaomi financial report and found that in 2020, xiaomi's R&D investment was 9.3 billion yuan, accounting for only 3.78% of the annual revenue, and did not achieve the "more than 10 billion yuan" promised by Lei Jun. Moreover, in the past few years, Xiaomi's R& D investment has accounted for between 2% and 4% of total revenue. In contrast, Huawei's annual R&D investment accounted for more than 14% of total revenue from 2015 to 2020, and Apple's R&D investment accounted for 2.57% of total revenue in 2015 and 4.64% in 2016, basically increasing year by year, to 6.83% in 2020. It can be seen that Xiaomi's research and development investment is not only lower than Apple, but also far behind Huawei.
Even compared with other Internet companies, Xiaomi's research and development investment is much inferior. For example, in the past two years, baidu's R&D expenditure has always remained at 15%-18%. In 2020, Alibaba's total R&D investment reached 57.236 billion yuan, second only to Huawei among Chinese enterprises; in 2020, Tencent's R&D investment was about 38.972 billion yuan, accounting for 8.08% of the annual revenue.
Producer: Nandu Big Data Research Institute
Data collection and analysis: Yang Xiaomin Yuan Jiongxian
Design: Lin Yongxi
Data source: corporate annual reports, Fortune, public media reports
![Li Yanhong, Lei Jun, Cheng Wei and others attended the Chinese New Year Tea Party of the Internet Society of China[fig]](data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAIAAAP///wAAACwAAAAAAQABAAACAkQBADs=)