It was learned from a number of independent sources that Geely Group's mobile phone company is in contact with mobile phone manufacturer "Meizu" to negotiate acquisitions. "The deal is still ongoing and DD (due diligence) is being done." Multiple people close to the deal told 36Kr.
In terms of the purchase price, the price is not clear as the transaction has not yet been closed.
Geely has taken action in the direction of making mobile phones. Shortly after Xiaomi announced the construction of the car, in September 2021, Geely Group established Hubei Xingji Times Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Xingji Times) to position the field of high-end mobile phones. Li Shufu, chairman of Geely Holding Group, once said about entering the mobile phone field:
"Mobile phones are the application carriers for electronic product market verification and software innovation, which not only allows users to share innovative results as soon as possible, but also transfers a safe and reliable part of the results to the application of automobiles, so as to realize the close interaction between car machines and mobile phone software technology."
According to Tianyan, Geely Group (Ningbo Limited) Company is the first generation shareholder of Xingji Times, holding 32% of the shares; Li Shufu himself holds 6.1% of the shares. Previously, Reuters news said that the total investment of the project is 10 billion yuan, and it is planned to launch mobile phone products in 2023.
A person familiar with the matter told 36Kr that the acquisition of Meizu was attended by Wang Yong, the legal representative, director and general manager of Xingji Times, who came forward to discuss the transaction.
36Kr asked Geely's Xingji Times Company and Meizu for verification on this matter, and as of press time, Xingji Times has not yet replied; Meizu officially replied to 36 Kr: "Thank you for your concern for Meizu."
In terms of capital reserves, the Star Age has been carrying out intensive capital increase recently. In December last year, Xingji Times completed an undisclosed strategic financing by Geely Group, Ningbo Boma and Jingkai Investment; on January 13, the shareholders of Xingji Times added Wuhan Jingkai Xingji Investment Fund Partnership (Limited Partnership), and the registered capital of the enterprise increased to 715 million yuan, an increase of 10%.
In addition to the reserve funds and grain, Geely's mobile phone team Xingji Times has been working intensively to save R&D and management teams.
From the management point of view, Wang Yong, CEO of Star Era, was the vice president of ZTE, mainly responsible for the market, and the leading products include ZTE's TD-SCDMA mobile phone and so on. After leaving ZTE, Wang Yong joined ASUS as deputy general manager of China. In addition, Wang Yong also has entrepreneurial experience and is relatively low-key in the mobile phone circle.
There are other executives from ZTE in the management team, such as Zhang Yadong, who was the general manager of ZTE's PHS product line, vice president of mobile phone research and development, and general manager of the mobile broadband product line. A person familiar with the matter told 36Kr that Zhang Yadong has "strong ability and good reputation."
36Kr learned that there have been employees with Xiaomi and OPPO backgrounds who have joined the Geely mobile phone team, such as Wang Wenjun, the head of system software, who has joined Xiaomi in 2010 and has since switched to OPPO.
The research and development teams of mobile phone manufacturers such as Xiaomi and OPPO are being targeted by the Geely mobile phone project. Some Xiaomi people recently revealed to 36Kr that "Geely is digging people from Xiaomi at 2 to 3 times the price", and another OPPO person also said to 36Kr, "Geely is also digging our people, all fields."
After inquiry, it was found that Star Era has recently submitted a number of mobile phone-related trademark applications, including "UPUPHONE", "Visitor", "Carry-on Screen" and so on. Another industry insider predicts for 36Kr that Geely mobile phones will most likely find Foxconn OEM in the future, and in terms of internal strategy, "vehicle-machine collaboration" is also planned.
However, geely mobile phone to produce a finished product, the most urgent task at the moment is how to piece together the mobile phone industry professionals as soon as possible. Direct acquisition, spending money to buy time, is a natural choice. Industry insiders to 36Kr analysis, despite the limited shipments, Meizu is now more valuable is to have a relatively complete mobile phone team.
For Meizu, being acquired may also be a fate that is difficult to escape.
Some mobile phone supply chain people told 36Kr that in the past two years, the annual shipment of Meizu mobile phones has dropped to about one million units. Compared with the shipment of 20 million units at its peak, it is no longer the same.
The shipment volume of mobile phone manufacturers is directly linked to the stability of the supply chain and the right to speak.
The above-mentioned person told 36Kr that the core product Meizu 17 in 2020 had limited shipments and less optical stabilization module capacity from the supply chain, resulting in repeated delays in the release time, and finally delayed from the spring to May. Some industry insiders estimate that if you look at the stacking configuration of Meizu 18, the shipment volume will be at least 2 million to ensure that the mobile phone business can be leveled.
Prior to this, Alibaba had been the first person to buy Meizu online. In February 2015, Alibaba Investment and Meizu acquired a 29.34% stake in Meizu Technology in the aforementioned Investment Agreement. However, in November 2021, the State Administration for Market Regulation issued an announcement that Ali was fined 500,000 yuan for violating the anti-monopoly law for the above actions.
In the fierce competition in the domestic mobile phone market, Meizu has been stuck in difficulties in recent years.
After the comeback of Meizu founder Huang Zhang in 2017, he immediately launched the Meizu 15, 16, 17, 18 four series - in order to focus on the high-end market, Huang Zhang led the cutting of sales to carry the sub-charm blue series.
This is accompanied by the successive departures of the so-called "Meizu Three Musketeers": after the departure of Bai Yongxiang, the former president of Meizu, in 2018 and 2019, Yang Yan and Li Nan, former senior vice presidents of Meizu Technology, stepped down one after another.
Meizu's strategy has also been quite wavering in recent years. For example, Meizu 18 released in March last year, in order to take the boutique route, the price broke through to about 4399 yuan, and the "three zeros" policy of "no advertising, no pre-installation, no push" as a marketing gimmick, at that time Meizu defined it as "the inflection point battle between safe and pure mobile phones and other mobile phones". However, this so-called "inflection point war" was declared a failure in half a year, and Meizu quickly and implicitly stated that it would no longer adhere to the zero advertising strategy.
Since then, Meizu mobile phones have given up the boutique route, and several follow-up models of the Meizu 18 series (Meizu 18s, 18X, etc.) are priced compared to Meizu 18, and the price has plunged significantly. In the near future, Meizu has restarted the Charm Blue series previously created by Li Nan, and the price of mobile phone products launched has dropped to 699 yuan.
Founded in 2003, with "MP3" to make a fortune, under the leadership of founder Huang Zhang, Meizu has been labeled "small and beautiful" in the industry for the excellent experience of product design, but even in 2015, Meizu won the highlight period of Ali investment, the annual shipment volume was hovering at 5 million units, and at that time, Huawei's mobile phone shipments had exceeded 75 million units, and Xiaomi exceeded 61 million units.
Judging from the current mobile phone market, it is difficult for low-end and niche groups to seek increments.
At the beginning of January, it was reported that the "Black Shark", which is known for its game phones, was to be acquired by Tencent, and after the completion of the transaction, Black Shark will link up with Tencent's game business to further plan the "meta-universe" territory; in this way, Geely, which is eager for car-machine coordination and spends 10 billion yuan to make mobile phones, has met the "small and beautiful" Meizu, which is a good home for both sides.
There are also rumors that Tencent may be eyeing B2C retail e-commerce such as Chaoduoduo app. Under the impact of the Internet tide and the epidemic, the concept of low-cost good things has long been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, the original price of thousands of luxury goods, tide brands can no longer attract emerging users, and the main low-cost retail tide duoduo and other platforms began to receive more people's attention, many 200 or so Adi, Chanel attracted millions of young people into the tide of more crazy robbery, perhaps this is the social embodiment of rational consumption upgrades.
