Wen 丨 Zero State LT (ID: LingTai_LT), Author 丨 Li Ren, Editor 丨 Hu Zhanjia
On February 16, according to an exclusive report by Sina Technology, Li Weixing, a member of Xiaomi's founding team and former vice chairman and secretary general of Xiaomi's technical committee, left his post. The report pointed out that Li Weixing is the No. 12 employee of Xiaomi, and on the day of the establishment of Xiaomi on April 6, 2010, Li Weixing was among the 13 people who drank millet porridge with Lei Jun. He was in charge of MIUI development in the early days and later moved to the Technical Committee.
Before the press release, according to NetEase Technology, Xiaomi related people said that this person did leave.
The previous day, On February 15, the news that Xiaomi planned to lay off 10% of its employees was very loud, and Xiaomi denied the news, saying that there were still more than 4,000 jobs in the recruitment of talents.
On February 8, the day after the start of the Year of the Tiger, Lei Jun posted on Weibo that Xiaomi Group successfully held the first important meeting of the Year of the Tiger - the high-end strategy seminar.
The Bo text reveals Lei Jun's passionate ambition, and shouts out three slogans that penetrate the back of the paper: the high-end road is the only way for Xiaomi to grow, and it is also the life and death battle for Xiaomi's development, and we will unswervingly implement the high-end strategy. There is a strategy, a goal, and a direction, claiming that the product experience should be benchmarked against the iPhone within three years, and win the first place in the domestic high-end mobile phone market share.
▲Photo: Lei Jun Weibo
If netizens have memories, they will find that this is not the first time that Lei Jun proposed to "impact the high-end", as early as 2019, the Redmi brand was spun off from Xiaomi, and at the Xiaomi 9 conference in the same year, Lei Jun made a high-profile declaration that Xiaomi would enter the high-end market. On December 28, 2021, Xiaomi 12 was officially released, and Lei Jun said that "Xiaomi high-end mobile phones are officially benchmarked against Apple".
The past 2021 has also been called the "key year" for "rice noodles" to impact the high-end.
Since Huawei was sanctioned in 2020, a whopping 60% of the domestic market share has become a vacuum. In the face of Huawei's high-end machine market share, the major domestic manufacturers represented by Xiaomi have successively launched their own impact high-end plans, but a year has passed, Apple is no longer invincible in the domestic high-end market, and the domestic high-end mobile phone market of more than 5,000 yuan, Apple's proportion has reached 75%, which can be described as huawei's lost market in the pocket.
And Millet, which is thunderous and rainy, is deeply involved in the public opinion of layoffs and the departure of the No. 12 executives, how long can the high-end road be strong? Where is the dilemma of the road itself?
01, the ultimate cost performance shackles
The first impression of Xiaomi mobile phones is "extreme cost performance".
On August 16, 2011, Xiaomi Mobile Phone 1 was officially released, as the first dual-core 1.5G smartphone in China, Xiaomi Mi 1 shook the domestic smartphone market with the fastest main frequency in the world, as low as 1999 yuan. At that press conference, 41-year-old Lei Jun shouted out the famous slogan , "Born for fever."
And how powerful is this sentence? It can be said that it still affects the brand tone of Xiaomi.
From the overall brand positioning, Xiaomi's mainstream models, publicity and promotion channel target groups, internal test mainstream groups, and MIUI design aesthetic orientation are all young Internet. That is to say, the main force for buying Xiaomi mobile phones is this group of digital enthusiasts who are happy to "fever", they have a unique philosophy of judging the quality of mobile phones, and tirelessly pursue the ultimate cost performance. This group of young customers who are shy and have a certain understanding of digital constitute the main group of Xiaomi mobile phones.
"Cost performance" was once the magic weapon for Xiaomi to seize the market, and now it has become the biggest shackle to its impact on the high-end. Under years of marketing, Xiaomi has always been known as the best hardware integrator, followed by the much-criticized neglect of quality control and user experience evaluation.
At present, on xiaomi community, douyin and other short video platforms, Weibo and other social platforms, complaint posts about Xiaomi 11 burning motherboards and broken WiFi have continued since March.
As a recognized "straight male aesthetic" in the industry, the texture of Xiaomi mobile phones is far less recognizable than apple and Huawei high-end models while maintaining aesthetics, nor does it focus on female aesthetics like OV. At the same time, due to the design idea of excessive stacking, Xiaomi's flagship models are often touching in weight. When customers get started with the real machine experience, the bulky feel and unpleasant appearance often dissuade women and middle-aged and elderly users.
▲Picture: User portraits of major mobile phone brands
Xiaomi's product design is largely constrained by Xiaomi's chaotic product line. Whether it is Apple's "one trick, eat all over the sky", or Huawei's mate main business, p-series main image, or the old manufacturer Samsung's note and s series two-pronged approach, the industry's recognized high-end manufacturers have clear product ideas, will not arbitrarily add or reduce functions.
At the press conference, the practice of comparing friends with their own lengths and the publicity method of some rice KOLs engaged in "digital rice circle" made the xiaomi brand image not very positive, and the female executive said that Xiaomi "got the world with dick silk", and even the "dick machine" was popular.
In the high-end machine market, "extreme cost performance" is not the version answer. In the years of marketing and development, the brand of hardware cost performance has been firmly bound to the xiaomi brand.
Some people in the industry can quote why Xiaomi's high-end road is difficult: success is also cost-effective, and failure is also cost-effective.
02, the fact that the software is left behind
On August 17, 2021, some users said that the new machine they purchased, Xiaomi 11, had serious quality problems such as crashes, camera failures, and disconnections. Not only the Xiaomi Mi 11 series, from the "hulu screen" incident of Xiaomi Mi 10 to the serious accumulation of heat in the Xiaomi Mi 12 series, these events are not unique.
As a mature manufacturer, there are a large number of quality problems in their own products, there are only two possibilities, one is that the quality control of the product line is too poor, the lack of factory testing, and the other is that the mobile phone test is insufficient, and the design steps are rushed.
In addition to hardware, the biggest factor that determines the quality of the mobile phone experience is the software strength of each manufacturer - the operating system and UI. In the high-end market, the software-level experience is the biggest part of the user experience compared to the cookie-cutter hardware configuration.
From Apple's IOS, Huawei's Hongmeng OS to Samsung's ONE UI, the currently recognized high-end machine manufacturers in the industry have their own unique software competitiveness.
The current Xiaomi has fallen behind in software. Why?
Xiaomi's MIUI, as the earliest deeply customized Android system in China, has always been one of Xiaomi's core competitiveness. Until 2021, MIUI has been known for its smooth and easy to use, rich functions and other features. And MIUI after 2021, there is a feature-rich appearance, accompanied by the adaptation problems that can not be used after the update of the old model and the widespread appearance of vicious bugs such as automatic restart and automatic screen rotation, so that MIUI has become one of the culprits of the instability of Xiaomi mobile phones, so that rice fans shouted when they were dissatisfied with Xiaomi: "Lei Jun! Jin Fan! ”。 This joke out of the circle makes many people who do not know Xiaomi remember Jin Fan, the leader of the MIUI project team.
▲Photo: Lei Jun's 2021 annual speech
MiUI's situation in 2021 has actually been foreshadowed.
As we all know, many of MIUI's rich feature modules come from community voting, and users will vote for the most anticipated features in the forum, and then urge developers to add them to MIUI. Although this is a good way to improve user participation, but too many functional modules not only make the MIUI system become bloated, but also in the Android version of the big change, directly facing a huge amount of optimization, adaptation problems, MIUI team tired of running, and finally can only hard scalp release a stability far less than the previous system, so that some millet users laughed: After MIUI there is no internal beta development version, all Xiaomi users are internal beta mice.
It is true that Xiaomi's flagship fast charging technology and imaging system are selling points, but high-end consumer groups say that they usually do not care about a few minutes of charging time, and the advantages of mobile phone imaging systems are difficult to reflect in automatic mode.
To put it simply, Xiaomi mistakenly believes that the high-end users it serves are the "enthusiasts" of ten years ago, but this is not the case. At present, most of the people who are used to using high-end flagships are "little whites" who do not like to toss mobile phones. A good brand should make the phone suitable for everyone, rather than making everyone pay the cost to fit the phone.
03, the technical advantages have been questioned repeatedly
After impacting the high-end market, on August 11, 2020, Xiaomi launched the first product focusing on the high-end market - Xiaomi 10 Ultra. As a commemorative work of Xiaomi's 10th anniversary, even after two years, it seems that the Xiaomi 10 Ultra's stacking material is exaggerated - the most powerful chip in the supply chain, high-pixel lens, super fast charging technology... As long as you can think of features and hardware, you can find it in it.
This is also the idea of Xiaomi to do high-end series, and the subsequent launch of MIX4, MIX Fold, and Xiaomi 11 Ultra all follow the route of stacking materials all the way.
▲图:Mi 10 Ultra
As a model of Xiaomi's impact on high-end cattle knife test, the Xiaomi 10 Ultra has become a typical representative of Xiaomi's high-end machine. However, this did not bring a decisive victory for Xiaomi, and the Xiaomi sales ranking in 2020 is still standing still, and the customer base has not expanded significantly.
The best way to maintain a good brand tone is to have your own core technology. Core technology is not only the cornerstone of the product line, but also the asset on which technology companies depend for their survival at a larger level.
Nowadays, the flagship "Royal Three Houses" have their own chips, and the more successful Apple A series and Huawei's Kirin series have always been hot selling points in the market. In addition, Apple's IOS, Huawei's Hongmeng OS, Samsung's screen and stylus technology are all the industry's top and unique core competitiveness.
In contrast, Xiaomi's performance in 2021, its technological advantages have been better than nothing.
The Xiaomi MIX series, which focuses on "black technology", has always been the core of Xiaomi's publicity. However, the recently launched MIX FOLD folding screen mobile phone in the case of mature technology to use the long strip "remote control" design and the original hinge make it the worst experience of the folding screen mobile phone, has always grabbed the black technology debut Xiaomi also made the MIX4's off-screen camera technology release two steps slower than ZTE. Rice noodles shouted "Xiaomi has no black technology anymore." ”
▲ Picture: Social platform evaluation of Xiaomi
At the same time, the price of the Xiaomi MIX FOLD, which represents the highest level of Xiaomi, has been reduced by more than 3,000 yuan compared with the pricing. And another MIX4 price also dived 2000 yuan.
"The chip and the screen are not yours, there are only marketing means left, and rice noodles are also limited." Industry insiders said that this is the lifeblood of domestic manufacturers such as Xiaomi. In his view, the chips and screens, the most core components of mobile phones, need to be supplied by Qualcomm and Samsung, which also causes a number of domestic mobile phone brands to frantically grab the first launch every time the Snapdragon flagship chip is released.
Xiaomi once tried its own chip. In 2017, the first mobile phone main processor Surging S1 was launched, but the speed of light was dismounted because the performance was too pulled down. Due to the small size of millet and the long return cycle of chip research and development, the plan was shelved, the project team left, and finally the chip project was not solved.
Compared with marketing, Xiaomi's determination and investment in core technology seem to be less hot.
04. Conclusion
As the most successful manufacturer of "Internetization", Xiaomi's product line is largely affected by the information and user feedback in the industry, but to do high-end machines, manufacturers need to have their own confidence, "proudly" adhere to their own design concepts, let the experience determine the design, design to create demand, rather than blindly catering to the market.
And Xiaomi rushed to the high road, still facing a severe challenge, its opponents have long been eyeing the tiger: vivo continues to exert efforts, in 2021, The Chinese mobile phone market annual sales ranking, ranked first, the market share accounted for 22%. OPPO vice president Liu Bo once said: "There are only two high-end brands in the mobile phone market, Apple and Huawei, and OPPO hopes to become the third." Zhao Ming, president of Glory, also said: "Glory and Apple will eventually have a war in the high-end market. ”
From "the coolest company in the heart of rice noodles" to the 2021 slip of the tongue "We never expect the expectations of rice noodles", the aging Lei Jun has led Xiaomi's most difficult high-end battle in the storm of layoffs and executives leaving.
However, how long can his high-end dream hold firm?