Samsung's backyard is on fire, the huge international market is waiting to be "divided", and the battle between domestic mobile phones and Apple will start again.
According to the Korea Times, on February 4, 2022, Samsung Electronics' union and its management failed to reach an agreement on 2021 wages, and the union will apply to the National Labor Relations Commission of South Korea for mediation.
If no agreement can be reached within the 10-day arbitration period, the union will thus be granted the legal right to strike.
The deadline for the arbitration period coincides with Valentine's Day on 2.14, but the "date" between the two parties is not sweet.
On the evening of February 14, Yonhap News Agency was quoted as saying that South Korea's National Labor Relations Commission decided to stop mediating wage negotiations between Samsung Electronics management and labor unions.
The failure of the two sides to mediate means that South Korea's largest conglomerate could face the threat of strikes for the first time in 53 years.
Samsung Electronics is an important subsidiary of Samsung Group and a giant in the electronics industry, with a market value of more than 2.6 trillion yuan.
Samsung Electronics' business covers almost all segments of the industry and has long been a global leader. Compared with To B's consumer electronics components and semiconductor chips, Samsung mobile phones are more familiar to consumers.
On the evening of February 9, Samsung held a special event for Unpacked 2022 and launched a new Galaxy S22 series flagship phone. At such an important juncture, the strike in its own backyard is undoubtedly a heavy blow to Samsung's brand image and the expected production and sales of new machines.
Source: Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra, Samsung official website
Since the fall of Nokia, Samsung mobile phones have been ranking first in global mobile phone shipments for many years. Since 2018, the global market share of Samsung mobile phones has stabilized at 19%-20%.
From feature phones to smart phones, Samsung mobile phones have developed steadily and stand firm.
Source: Counterpoint, Market Monitor Service, Collation by Alpha Workshop Research Institute
Global mobile phone sales have tended to be stable, and major mobile phone manufacturers have their own characteristics and target customer groups, and the overall share is relatively fixed.
Before the advent of revolutionary innovations, competition in the mobile phone industry was relatively stable, unless it was unfortunate to encounter a "black swan" event.
来源：Counterpoint，Market Monitor Service
The fuse that changes the landscape
Once, Samsung mobile phones were also regarded as the king of the machine in the Chinese mainland, from low-end to high-end to fully occupy the domestic market.
In 2013, Samsung led the way with an 18.7% share of the domestic mobile phone market. However, the "explosion door" incident in 2016 directly led to the decline of Samsung mobile phones in the mainland, mobile phone sales took a sharp turn, and domestic mobile phone manufacturers Huami OV (Huawei, Xiaomi, Vivo and OPPO) followed the trend to achieve overtaking.
Nowadays, Samsung stores have frequently closed, and physical stores have found it difficult to find traces of Samsung mobile phones. At the same time, the sales statistics of domestic mobile phone manufacturers have not been able to find Samsung's ranking.
According to the operation manager of an online platform, the online sales of Samsung mobile phones in China are basically negligible, although the Samsung explosion door incident has passed for many years, but the brand shadow still lingers in the minds of consumers. The sales data of Tmall and JD.com, as well as the votes on the forum, support this view.
It can really be said: Samsung NOTE exploded, blowing up the entire mainland market.
It can be seen that even if it is as strong as Samsung, the regional industry position is not unshakable. The emergence of the "black swan" event is a direct trigger for the transformation of the industry pattern.
4 years after Samsung encountered Waterloo on the mainland, Huawei is still struggling.
Huawei, as the top high-tech company in China, has made breakthroughs in the field of chip design in the past few years. Backed by its own technology, Huawei's terminal mobile phone sales have climbed all the way, and the speed of progress has made competitors such as Samsung and Apple shudder.
In 2019, the total global sales of Huawei mobile phones have reached 238 million, ranking second in the world with a market share of 16.14%, second only to Samsung; in the second quarter of 2020, Huawei's single-quarter sales surpassed Samsung and Apple for the first time and topped the list.
Due to well-known reasons, Huawei's 5G chips have been blocked, resulting in a sharp decline in sales of its terminal mobile phones. Affected by the mobile phone business, Huawei's performance is not ideal.
Until 2021, Huawei expects revenue to be about 634 billion yuan, down 28.9% year-on-year.
Recently, in the Voice Community, Huawei's internal employee community platform, a Huawei person released a post titled "New Year's Wishes, 1.58 is not high, but we firmly believe that spring will come", implying that Huawei's dividend forecast for 2021 is 1.58 yuan / share.
Under the assumption that the total number of shares remains unchanged, it seems that the total amount of dividends fell by 15% year-on-year (public data shows that Huawei's dividend in 2020 is 1.86 yuan / share).
At present, Huawei's mobile phone shipments have no statistics in the international market.
Looking at the domestic market alone, Huawei's market share plummeted from 31% in 2020 to 10% in 2021, a year-on-year decline of nearly 68%. After all, in the 5G era, Huawei's 4G mobile phones that have to be produced are difficult to be competitive.
So, will this Samsung civil unrest be another opportunity to reshuffle the cards? Although Samsung's market share in China is already very low or even negligible, there is still a huge room for encroachment in the international market with annual sales of 270 million.
Can domestic mobile phones seize the opportunity this time?
Huawei fell, Apple was full
Huawei's vacant market share is nearly 21%, what brand eats this part of the cake?
According to Counterpoint data, Vivo, OPPO, Apple and Xiaomi have equally divided Huawei's domestic market vacancies, and their respective domestic market shares have increased by about 5%.
Source: Counterpoint Research Market Pulse
The comparison of the whole year is not direct enough, and it seems that the speed of the major manufacturers in the head is similar.
From another perspective, the data of the fourth quarter of 2021 that has just passed shows the acceleration of the major manufacturers' food sharing. Obviously, the market share and sales of vivo, OPPO and xiaomi are relatively stable, and Apple (AAPL.US) is the biggest beneficiary.
When it comes to Apple, all kinds of praise words stretch endlessly like a gushing river. From the perspective of consumers, Apple has a super wide user base, smooth system plus stylish appearance, attracting many "fruit powder" fascinated.
From a business point of view, Apple's ultra-high product pricing and significantly leading the industry's gross profit margin make its brand recognition unique in the consumer electronics industry.
For the first time since the fourth quarter of 2015, Apple's mobile phone ranked first in domestic sales, accounting for 23% of the market share.
Thanks to the big sale of the iPhone 13, Apple not only reached a new high in sales in Greater China, but also reached an unprecedented height in global sales, as can be seen from Apple's fourth quarter financial report.
Last quarter, Apple's revenue was $123.95 billion, up 11.2% year-on-year, a record quarterly high; net profit was $34.63 billion, up 20.4% year-on-year, beating market expectations.
Among them, iPhone revenue was $71.63 billion, an increase of 9.2% year-on-year. The iPhone is an important source of revenue and profit for Apple.
By region, revenue in Greater China increased by 11.2% year-on-year, continuing its record. Consolidated gross margin was 43.8%, an increase of 4 percentage points year-on-year.
Apple's high sales, on the one hand, because of lower product pricing, have merged market share downwards; on the other hand, Huawei has withdrawn, giving up some of the high-end mobile phone vacancies, triggering consumption shifts.
Objectively speaking, the precision and aesthetics of Apple products are indeed second to none in the industry. To summarize Apple's advantages, there are mainly the following three points:
First, the product quality is high and the user satisfaction is high.
Second, Apple has many core technology patents, and the card slot advantage is obvious.
Third, Apple's self-developed chip perfectly matches its own IOS system, and the user experience is excellent.
Fourth, Apple's overall ecology is perfect, and the synergy between terminals is convenient for users, thus deepening the stickiness of the brand.
Regardless of whether the end market price is high or low, Apple has no shortage of considerable iron powder support. Brand influence has been deeply rooted in the hearts of the people, "high-end" and "YYDS" seem to have become synonymous with Apple.
Such rock-solid cognition lays an "insurmountable" moat for Apple. Domestic mobile phones also did not sit still, each showing their magic and taking the initiative to attack, but the effect was not satisfactory.
Can domestic mobile phones carry the banner?
Domestic smart phones from the earlier "cottage machine" gradually through scientific and technological innovation and industrial chain improvement to complete their self-transformation, to achieve a significant improvement in functionality and practicality.
With the deep ploughing of the domestic market, the market share has expanded rapidly, and by 2021, the top five manufacturers of domestic mobile phones (vivo, OPPO, Xiaomi, Honor and Huawei) have sat on 81% of the domestic market share. However, looking at the global market, the higher-end share is still firmly occupied by Apple.
Processor chips are synonymous with high-end, and this has always been the most painful wound for domestic mobile phones.
Once, Huawei's Kirin chip has gradually approached Apple's self-developed chip in terms of performance and power consumption.
However, at this stage, most domestic high-end mobile phones can only rely on Qualcomm chips (manufactured by TSMC) and MediaTek chips (manufactured by TSMC).
Without Huawei's competition, the products of these two chip designers seem to have slowed down the pace of progress, and product heat problems are frequent.
There is no initiative, even if there is a problem with the processor chip, the domestic mobile phone still has no way to do, and can only accept it.
At the same time, Apple continues to insist on research and development, and the chip process is becoming more and more advanced. So that every year the new CPU chips dominate in performance, gradually widening the gap with competitors.
Therefore, the processor chip can not be controlled independently is the biggest disadvantage of domestic mobile phones. The closed loop of the industrial chain has not been completed, making the domestic mobile phone more like an assembly machine and lacking recognition.
In addition to processor chips, domestic mobile phones have made many attempts in other aspects in anticipation of catching up with Apple.
First of all, use the advantages of the industrial chain to superimpose mature software and hardware to attract consumers.
Once Apple as the absolute leader of the mobile phone technology industry, every year Apple's newly launched "black technology" will also be used as a target for domestic machines to imitate.
After 2016, Apple entered the era of micro-innovation, and the new products released every year were no longer "revolutionary" compared to older products.
At this time, the domestic machine looks at the upgrade of the future user's camera demand, and takes the lead in launching the rear dual/triple camera flagship model. This is a milestone for the domestic machine to impact Apple in the field of product technology innovation.
In the subsequent product iteration, domestic mobile phone manufacturers are full of sincerity, improve camera pixels, superimpose the number of cameras, coupled with post-software optimization, and pursue the ultimate camera application experience.
However, a user who switched from a domestic mobile phone to an Apple mobile phone expressed to the author the significant difference between the two in terms of taking pictures: the domestic mobile phone uses too much beauty optimization and appears unreal.
Apple can achieve a relatively realistic imaging effect. The requirement for imaging authenticity is one of the most important factors in his support for the Apple camp.
It can be seen that the optimization of the system is not a simple hardware stack, even if the hardware parameters on paper are better than Apple, the actual effect is often not comparable.
The result of stacking hardware for domestic mobile phones is to increase costs, push up prices, and reduce profits, and the final user experience is still inferior to Apple.
Second, continue to use cost-effectiveness to increase market share.
With the rapid development of the domestic smart phone industry chain, the quality of domestic mobile phones has indeed improved significantly.
At the same time, thanks to the sharp decline in the cost of parts, domestic manufacturers see the opportunity to seize the sinking market with cost-effective products, seize market share, and successfully attract the majority of consumer customers.
OPPO and Vivo mainly focus on the sinking market of third- and fourth-tier cities, while Glory and Xiaomi focus on the Internet market.
Under the premise of stable development, domestic mobile phones take the initiative to impact the high-end and expand their high-end product lines in order to enhance their brand recognition in the target customer base.
However, the price range of the domestic mobile phone is 1500-3000 yuan, and the high-end flagship mobile phone is high, but the sales are pitiful.
Correspondingly, the price range of Apple's high-end new machine is 5000-10000 yuan, which is obviously not at the same level as the average price of domestic mobile phones, and high-end mobile phones are the untouchable ceiling of most domestic mobile phones.
A survey shows that 80% of Apple users continue to choose Apple for mobile phones, which is enough to see Apple users' own trust and support for brand value.
So, why are Apple users reluctant to switch to domestic Android machines?
There are many reasons, some because old Apple users are accustomed to Apple's system and interface, have not used the Android system, and need higher learning costs.
Some people think that Apple products have certain social attributes, especially for young people and branded people, Apple has formed its own circle culture.
There are also Apple users who have more than one Apple product, the ecological synergy effect is more obvious, and changing other brands of mobile phones will lead to a significant reduction in production and living efficiency, or a significant increase in replacement costs.
The formation of these reasons is not an overnight achievement, because the early domestic mobile phones did not meet apple-like high standards, so that consumers formed a preconceived brand gap, which seriously hindered the high-end strategy of domestic mobile phones.
And Apple has not stopped, under the premise of stabilizing the high-end market, taking the initiative to reduce the price, relying on its own reputation to gradually erode the share of mid-range brands.
Domestic sales won the top spot with a market share of 23%, Apple's downward penetration has begun to bear fruit, and domestic mid-range machines are in jeopardy.
Finally, quickly push forward the folding screen mobile phone, looking forward to achieving corner overtaking.
Recently, honor, OPPO and other domestic mobile phones have successively launched a relatively mature next-generation folding screen mobile phone, hoping to lead apple to achieve future trends.
Source: Honor, OPPO official website
It seems to be an innovative combination of mobile phones and tablets, but the super high price dissuads many interested potential consumers.
Not only that, but the folding screen also has many imperfections. For example, the hinge in the center of the screen will be uneven after being used many times, and the adapted killer APP has not yet appeared.
Samsung's "civil unrest" should have been a good time for domestic mobile phones to justify their own names. However, the chip is uncontrollable, the system is unreliable, the technology is not advanced and many other problems are entangled, superimposed on Apple's poor pursuit, whether the domestic mobile phone can support its own piece of the sky, or a question mark.