As we all know, since Huawei's mobile phone suffered sniper attack, coupled with the impact of the epidemic in the past two years, the global smartphone market has suffered a great impact, and the entire smartphone market competition pattern and shipments have also undergone subtle changes.
In 2022, global smart phones will continue to maintain the growth trend, on the one hand, because the new crown epidemic is clear, making the demand for smart phones increase; on the other hand, the price of folding screen mobile phones will continue to decline, and the overall shipment volume will increase significantly, prompting domestic high-end models to explore new ways out;
The world's first-line mobile phone brands will continue to develop in a diversified direction based on smart hardware.
2021 domestic mobile phone brand shipments TOP3: OPPO/ Xiaomi / vivo
First of all, let's take a look at the shipments of China's top five smartphone brands in 2021, overall, the total shipments of China's first-line mobile phone brands maintained a growth of 7% in 2021; according to Morgan Stanley Research estimates, the top five mobile phone brands in China in 2021 are Xiaomi, OPPO, vivo and Huawei/Honor series.
Source: Morgan Stanley Research estimates
Among them, Xiaomi ranks first with an expected shipment of about 200 million units, an increase of 33.33%-42.85% year-on-year compared with 2020; followed by OPPO with shipments of 180-190 million units, an increase of 20%-35% year-on-year; the third is vivo with shipments of 150-160 million units, an increase of 15.38%-33.33% year-on-year.
JW insights believes that the total shipments of domestic first-line mobile phone brands such as Xiaomi, OPPO, vivo, Huawei/Honor, etc. in 2021 show an overall growth trend, mainly for three reasons: First, relative to 2020, the domestic new crown epidemic has improved, prompting the demand for domestic smartphones to increase year-on-year; second, benefiting from the dividend of the global mobile phone brand shipment concentration trend, first-line mobile phone brands as beneficiaries; third, accelerating the entry into overseas markets, so that the overall shipments have increased.
At the same time, the comparison can be found that in 2021, Huawei/Honor series shipments fell sharply, and JW insights believes that after the decline in Huawei/Honor series shipments, its market share was obtained to a certain extent by Xiaomi, OPPO and vivo, and Apple also obtained some high-end markets from them; and the domestic low-end market share was mainly dominated by the domestic first-line three.
However, in the view of JW insights, in 2022, Honor will become a new "variable" for domestic mobile phone brands, because after the separation from Huawei, the Honor brand and supply chain system have been independent, and after more than a year of repair, Honor is expected to return to the first-line brand market, which will have a certain impact on the shipments of Xiaomi, OPPO, Vivo and other domestic three in 2022.
Global smartphones in 2022 will grow by 5.9% year-on-year: the Chinese market may decline year-on-year
Second, looking ahead to global smartphone shipments in 2022, according to DIGIMIES Research data, it predicts that next year's global smartphone shipments will increase by 5.9% year-on-year to 1.392 billion units.
Source: DIGITIMES Research
It is worth noting that according to the data, the Chinese market will see a year-on-year decline of 2.9% in smartphones in 2022, while overseas market shipments will increase by 8.6% year-on-year.
Taking 5G mobile phones as an example, DIGITIMES Research data shows that the market share of 5G mobile phones in the Chinese market will reach 86.7% in 2022, which is expected to increase by more than 10% compared with 2021.
The proportion of 5G smartphone shipments in overseas markets will also climb rapidly, and DIGITIMES Research data predicts that 5G smartphones in overseas markets will increase by up to 55.5% year-on-year next year.
However, JW insights believes that although the global smartphone market will continue to grow in 2022 and 5G smartphone shipments will continue to climb, it seems that the market has fallen into a stagflation state, and this trend will not improve much in the short term, so we predict that the overall shipment growth will not be very large.
In addition, from the perspective of the growth rate of domestic first-line mobile phone brands, the shipment growth of Honor in 2022 or will grow rapidly, and it is expected to become the fastest growing first-line mobile phone brand in China, while the growth rate of Xiaomi, OPPO and vivo may slow down because of Glory grabbing the market.
New trends in the development of smart phone manufacturers in 2022: smart home / wear + meta-universe + folding screen mobile phones
JW insights believes that looking forward to 2022, the world's first-line mobile phone brands will continue to expand towards a diversified perspective on the basis of smart phones, among which the smart home and smart wearable markets that have achieved achievements will continue to maintain growth, such as TWS headphones, smart watches/bracelets and other products.
For example, in the smart home market, according to IDC data, the annual shipment volume in 2021 is expected to be 230 million units, an increase of 14.6% year-on-year. In the next five years, China's smart home device market shipments will continue to increase at a compound growth rate of 21.4%, and the market shipments will approach 540 million units in 2025. And smartphone manufacturers are one of the forces that cannot be ignored.
At the same time, driven by Apple, meta-universe products may be exploded. According to market estimates, Apple will launch arable headsets in the fourth quarter of 2022, and by 2025, AR glasses or will come out, Apple aims to replace the iPhone with AR/VR devices in 10 years, according to the current iPhone users of more than 1 billion people, which means that Apple will sell at least 1 billion AR/VR devices in 10 years.
According to the latest report of Trend Force, Metacosmity will promote more manufacturers to invest in the construction of the virtual world, and it is estimated that global VR/AR equipment shipments will rise to 12.02 million units in 2022, with an annual growth rate of 26.4%. Counterpoint predicts that shipments of Extended Reality (XR) headsets are expected to grow from 11 million units in 2021 to 105 million units in 2025, an increase of about 10 times.
Source: Counterpoint
According to the statistics of JW insights, many of the original mobile phone industry chain enterprises have entered the meta-universe product market, such as Hon Hai, Pegatron, Renbao, Wistron, Goertek and other foundries, and then such as Lixun Precision, YujingGuang, Gongda Electroacoustics, Crystal Optoelectronics, Changxin Technology, Anjie Technology, Dafu Technology, Shuobeide, Xinwei Communications, Lens Technology, Jiahe Intelligence, Lianchuang Electronics and other supply chain manufacturers.
In addition, JW insights also believes that folding screen mobile phones will become a new blockbuster product in the mobile phone market in 2022. According to JW insights, the current folding screen mobile phone price has begun to plummet, and this trend will be more obvious in 2022, prompting the market to become stronger, and the overall shipment will rise rapidly.
As of now, the domestic first-line mobile phone brands Xiaomi, OPPO, Huawei, Honor, etc. have launched folding screen mobile phones, and OPPO's folding screen mobile phone prices are as low as 7699 yuan, Samsung's folding screen mobile phones are also as low as 7599 yuan, and the trend of further downward price exploration will intensify.
According to the research data of DSCC, a well-known market research agency, in the third quarter of 2021, the total shipments of folding screen mobile phones increased by 215% month-on-month and soared by 480% year-on-year. In addition, according to Counterpoint data, the global shipment of folding screens is expected to reach 9 million units in 2021, an increase of 200% year-on-year; shipments in 2023 are expected to increase by 10 times compared with 2020 shipments.
JW insights believes that the smart phone market in 2022 is still in a state of stock competition, the overseas 5G market will grow rapidly, and the major first-line mobile phone brands based on the basis of smart phones, will further enter the VR/AR, smart home and other more peripheral hardware markets, for the mobile phone market, 2022 folding screen mobile phone or will achieve rapid growth, is expected to promote the development of the industry. (Proofreading/Sami)