Domestic mobile phones are difficult to "cross" high-end

After Huawei's absence from the high-end market due to "lack of core", in the past two years, domestic mobile phone manufacturers have successively aimed at the layout of this field, in order to seize the high-end mobile phone market space vacated by Huawei, but in terms of actual performance, the effect seems to be less than ideal. Vivo recently announced the withdrawal of the NEX series, becoming the first manufacturer to fold the nex series on the high-end line.

Vivo folded itself

Nex, which was rumored to have been revoked, was withdrawn very cleanly.

As the first attempt of vivo's high-end flagship series, NEX, which was launched in June 2018, had high hopes: the conference was huge, the product had an independent R&D and marketing team, and the style of behavior was different from the previous vivo mobile phone. The lifting camera and zero world full screen of the first generation of NEX mobile phones have indeed attracted great attention, but follow-up products such as vivo NEX dual screen version, vivo NEX 3/3S seem to have failed to reach the height of a generation of NEX, in terms of "exploring technological breakthroughs", some people commented that the next generations of NEX products are somewhat "flowing in the form" and "innovating for the sake of innovation".

Looking back at NEX's development history in the past four years, it can be found that its positioning in vivo's product line is becoming more and more vague and awkward. At the beginning, it was mainly to "supplement the vivo high-end product line", but with the positioning of the best-selling X series and the price rising, NEX had difficulty finding its own foothold. As can be seen on the product, after the NEX 3S in March 2020, there has been no new product action in NEX for two consecutive years. Some insiders in the industry also analyzed that "NEX's product positioning is more awkward, vivo Zeiss images and self-developed chips are used in the X series, the innovation difference between the two is very small, NEX is a bit unsupported." Moreover, its investment and sales do not match." Poor sales and too high costs are another major reason why the person analyzed vivo's cutting off the high-end NEX series.

"This department did not meet the expectations of the boss, and the boss was unwilling to spend money anymore," a vivo front-line employee confirmed the news that NEX was "revoked" and poor business performance, a decision that has been reported by email throughout the company. Although Jia Jingdong, vice president of vivo brand, stressed that "the exploration and innovation mission of the original NEX series for new experiences and new forms will not disappear", it will be carried by the "flagship product X series", but shrinking the product line, can it really make a better high-end force?

In the view of E Xia Jun, NEX merged into the X series for shrinkage adjustment, which can indeed reduce costs and increase efficiency for vivo to a certain extent, avoid waste of resources, and better invest in research and development with more concentrated resources. But on the other hand, when the user's inherent impression of the X series, which is the main "mid-range", has not yet gained a foothold in the high-end market, and its "black technology" gene is not obvious, it is difficult to let the X series carry the high-end dream of vivo's "futuristic feeling". The end of the NEX series largely means that if the follow-up vivo does not have enough hard-core technical support, the door of the high-end market will be difficult to be easily knocked on.

Where is the "difficulty" of the high-end road of domestic mobile phones?

The impact on the high-end market is not optimistic not only vivo, the other two major domestic mobile phone manufacturers OPPO and Xiaomi are no exception.

In late February, OPPO handed over the 2022 high-end flagship machine answer sheet - OPPO Find X5, priced at 3999 yuan, the Pro version sold up to 6799 yuan, the absolute price of the high-end machine. However, the evaluation given by the outside media and netizens is mostly like this: "In terms of overall parameters, find X5 Pro is more like the image upgrade version of one plus 10 Pro", "It can be seen that it is a crazy stack of 'high-end' configurations", "The whole conference feels like there is no big surprise after watching it"...

At this conference, OPPO CPO Liu Zuohu and others spent a long time talking about the non-core configuration of the mobile phone back shell, feel, color, etc., for the most anticipated Pro Tianji version of the outside world, but only took out a few minutes, and quickly ended the introduction. It is undeniable that the Find X5 series has been upgraded in many aspects such as design, body color matching, chips, screens, cameras, etc., but objectively speaking, its real differentiated technology and can play are not many, not only the core configuration is similar to other domestic brand flagship machines, the price is not grounded, obviously this product does not tell a "new" story.

"Although after Huawei is out of stock, OPPO and other mobile phone manufacturers compete for the high-end market, they mainly invest their energy in the marketing side, and core strengths such as technology research and development cannot be made up for a while," a mobile phone industry insider said. In terms of market feedback, in fact, OPPO's self-developed image NPU chip Mariana X adds a lot of points to it, which can make the mobile phone shoot 4K video with clearer details in the night scene. However, E Xia Jun also learned from the analysis of relevant industry insiders that compared with the SoC chip of the set, the research and development of the image chip is relatively less complicated in terms of technology, and in the long run, this is not a unique barrier technology, in other words, it is far from enough to impact the high-end market with such a chip.

Xiaomi, which is also carrying out self-developed chips, has a similar "high-end disaster" with OPPO, as early as the beginning of 2017, Xiaomi had released a self-developed chip surging S1, which is a mobile phone SoC chip using TSMC's 28nm process, but due to performance and other reasons, it has not stirred up too many waves in the market, and the presence of the surging chip has almost disappeared. Until March last year, Lei Jun took out a self-developed ISP image chip surging C1, which was once mounted on the MIX Fold folding screen mobile phone; At the end of 2021, Xiaomi once again launched the self-developed charging chip surging P1. After several twists and turns, it can be seen that Xiaomi's thinking is no different from OPPO and other companies, and they have temporarily abandoned the system-level chips that take a long time to develop and are difficult to develop, and mostly focus on the development of ISPs, NPUs and other modular chips that enhance imaging capabilities, but it is also therefore reducing the effect of differentiated competition.

Chip research and development is not achieved overnight, it requires long-term technology accumulation and sustained resource investment, Huawei from 1991 to today has been on this road for 31 years. From the perspective of input and short-term output, perhaps we should give MORE tolerance to OPPO, Xiaomi and other enterprises, after all, taking the first step means that there is a possibility of success. However, from this stage, CINNO Research data shows that in 2021, apple's share of the domestic mobile phone market above 5,000 yuan will rise from 48% in 2020 to 75%. The cake left by Huawei is still swallowed by Apple, whether it is OPPO, vivo, millet, or is exploring high-end glory with the "Magic" series, their current technical strength is obviously not able to catch the high-end flagship market vacated by Huawei.

High-end is a "hard bone", it is difficult in the "chip" and not only the chip. Apple has a closed iOS operating system, self-developed A-series chips and an ecological experience of software and hardware integration; Huawei's Kirin chip supported by HiSilicon, as well as the IoT ecosystem created by this chip and Hongmeng system, are beyond the reach of other domestic mobile phone manufacturers; With a complete industrial chain such as Samsung, it is not only a mobile phone, but also a screen, chip and even panel and other technologies supply, the supply relationship brought by the right to speak advantage makes it occupy a favorable position in the global high-end mobile phone market... Compared with the reference, it will take a long time for domestic mobile phones to challenge brands such as Apple in the high-end market.

However, on another level, the biggest boost to the high end is always the recognition of consumers. The biggest advantage of domestic mobile phone brands is that they are closer to consumers and can sense the new needs of the terminal market in time, and fast charging is a better case. To break through or even topped the high-end market, in the view of E Xia Jun, the only way to continue to innovate and attack the tough points is to use product power to speak. The "high-end" effect brought by brand marketing is often temporary and short-lived, in order to be long-term and truly stand tall, the brand also needs to come up with excellent product strength, of course, this must rely on independent hardware to achieve independent software, so as to create an independent experience to achieve. In this process, perhaps we need to give more patience and a little confidence to domestic mobile phone brands that are gradually increasing investment in research and development.

Domestic mobile phones are difficult to "cross" high-end

Abstract: Behind vivo's "self-cut" high-end line NEX, where is the high-end road of domestic mobile phones?

"This department did not meet the expectations of the boss, and the boss was unwilling to spend money anymore," a vivo front-line employee confirmed the news that NEX was "revoked" and poor business performance, a decision that has been reported by email throughout the company. Although Jia Jingdong, vice president of vivo brand, stressed that "the exploration and innovation mission of the original NEX series for new experiences and new forms will not disappear", it will be carried by the "flagship product X series", but shrinking the product line, can it really make a better high-end force?

Where is the "difficulty" of the high-end road of domestic mobile phones?

"Although after Huawei is out of stock, OPPO and other mobile phone manufacturers compete for the high-end market, they mainly invest their energy in the marketing side, and core strengths such as technology research and development cannot be made up for a while," a mobile phone industry insider said. In terms of market feedback, in fact, OPPO's self-developed image NPU chip Mariana X adds a lot of points, which can make the mobile phone shoot 4K video with clearer details in the night scene. However, E Xia Jun also learned from the analysis of relevant industry insiders that compared with the SoC chip of the set, the research and development of the image chip is relatively less complicated in terms of technology, and in the long run, this is not a unique barrier technology, in other words, it is far from enough to impact the high-end market with such a chip.

Xiaomi, which is also carrying out self-developed chips, has a similar "high-end disaster" with OPPO, as early as the beginning of 2017, Xiaomi had released a self-developed chip surging S1, which is a mobile phone SoC chip using TSMC's 28nm process, but due to performance and other reasons, it has not stirred up too many waves in the market, and the presence of the surging chip has almost disappeared. Until March last year, Lei Jun took out a self-developed ISP image chip surging C1, which was once installed on the MIX Fold folding screen mobile phone; at the end of 2021, Xiaomi once again launched the self-developed charging chip surging P1. After several twists and turns, it can be seen that Xiaomi's thinking is no different from OPPO and other companies, and they have temporarily abandoned the system-level chips that take a long time to develop and are difficult to develop, and mostly focus on the development of ISPs, NPUs and other modular chips that enhance imaging capabilities, but it is also therefore reducing the effect of differentiated competition.

High-end is a "hard bone", it is difficult in the "chip" and not only the chip. Apple has a closed iOS operating system, self-developed A-series chips and a software-hard integration of the ecological experience; Huawei's Kirin chip supported by HiSilicon, as well as the IoT ecology created by this chip and Hongmeng system, etc. make other domestic mobile phone manufacturers unattainable; and with a complete industrial chain such as Samsung, it is both a mobile phone, but also a screen, chip and even panel and other technologies, and the discourse power advantage brought by the supply relationship makes it occupy a favorable position in the global high-end mobile phone market... Compared with the reference, it will take a long time for domestic mobile phones to challenge brands such as Apple in the high-end market.