A few days ago, a blogger @ Logue said that Weilai Shenzhen mobile phone research and development department has frequent actions, and funds are also continuing to increase investment.
In the past two years, many mobile phone giants have begun to build cross-border cars, including Apple, Xiaomi, Huawei, etc., although other manufacturers have not openly entered the game, many are also accumulating relevant technology and experience.
In addition to the cross-border car manufacturing of mobile phone manufacturers, Geely has also announced that it will cross-border mobile phones, which is also the first car company to enter the mobile phone industry, and today the second car company to build mobile phones has fallen on the head of Weilai.
In response to this matter, there are currently two views in the mainstream, one side believes that Weilai or will open the mobile phone business and enter the consumer electronics industry; while the other view is that Weilai's move is intended to study the car machine system, optimize the car machine network, and will realize the interactive function with the Weilai car machine on the mobile phone, for example, mobile phone & car machine file mutual transmission, AR, VR resource projection, NOMI voice assistant mobile phone version.
According to relevant sources, Weilai's mobile phone business is determined to be done, and the project is currently in the initial stage of research.
Vigorously expand the recruitment of relevant personnel
According to the recruitment website search, Weilai mobile phone department has recently made a lot of moves, and there are more than 100 new offers issued years later, and more than 200 R& D positions will be added in the near future, and the working place is Shenzhen Qianhai Excellence.
According to sources, Yin Shuijun, former president of Meitu Mobile Phone, has joined Weilai and taken the lead in taking charge of Weilai's mobile phone business.
The source also revealed: "The project has been established for a while, and the current team is located in Shenzhen, doing personnel recruitment." ”
From the job information released on the recruitment website, it can also be found that WEI HAS released a large number of mobile phone business related positions, including BSP engineers, communication test engineers, imaging chip design engineers, etc.
Weilai responded that "there is no information to disclose at present, and further information will be communicated with everyone."
In addition, informed sources also revealed that Weilai's mobile phone planning was long before Xiaomi announced the construction of cars.
In fact, there is a precedent for automakers to lay out mobile phone business. The emergence of the tide of intelligent and networked reform has greatly enriched the application scenarios of automobiles, so that there are many possibilities for interconnection and interoperability of automobiles and mobile phones. Whether it is a car or a mobile phone, it is part of the intelligent ecology, and the competition of future technology companies is no longer focused on a single product, but a set of intelligent ecology composed of various products.
An important part of the future ecology
It is worth mentioning that in September 2021, Geely Holding Group issued a document saying that Li Shufu entered the field of mobile phones and positioned high-end services globally. In January this year, Geely Group's mobile phone company was exposed to be in contact with mobile phone manufacturer "Meizu" to negotiate an acquisition.
At that time, for the above acquisition, Geely officials said: "We do not comment on market rumors, the high-end mobile phone research and development business of the Star Era is progressing in an orderly manner, and we hope to create an open and integrated ecological partnership." ”
Mobile phone giants such as Apple, Huawei, and Xiaomi, which are well known as apples, have also joined the car manufacturing field. In summary, Weilai Automobile's mobile phone will probably be a high probability event. This will also be another wave of mobile phone industry after Geely Li Shufu entered the mobile phone field.
Tesla has also been exposed to be interested in entering the field of smart phones, and it is certain that Tesla has realized the importance of building a user ecology like Geely. It is reported that Tesla may be developing an apple-like app store that allows car owners to download and install apps on their own, thereby creating a software and hardware ecological chain of Tesla's own brand.
Obviously, compared to the car, the user stickiness of the mobile phone is greater, we assume a scenario, when the Apple or Xiaomi mobile phone users buy a car in the future, for the ecological experience, it is not possible to buy An Apple /Xiaomi car, and the user inertia is obviously a very worthwhile point for the mobile phone company that wants to build a car.
In particular, there are already Huawei Hongmeng system pearl jade in the front, for Huawei mobile phone users to use the scene is very convenient, or huawei mobile phone users are likely to guide to the use of Hongmeng OS car machine system on the car products. Car companies obviously can't allow such a thing to happen, so they have personally made mobile phones and used their own ecological experience to attract and retain users.
The reason is that the competition of future technology companies is no longer focused on a single product, but a set of intelligent ecology composed of various products, and the large ecology built around mobile phones will be a key part of enhancing the core competitiveness of smart electric vehicles in the future.