Text | Pole Business, author | Yang Ming, Editor | Liu Shanshan
"In the future, can we only rely on X to benchmark OPPO's Find series?"
At the beginning of March, the "Blue Factory" vivo high-end sub-brand NEX folded the sand, and after being rescinded in February this year, its business unit and subordinate organizations continued to cause heated discussions, and many netizens commented on it.
Netizens' doubts seem to be about to become a reality. Recently, the market rumors that vivo is about to launch the first folding screen mobile phone vivo X Fold - according to the previous vice president of vivo Jia Jingdong, vivo in the high-end market layout, will be carried by the series, it can be seen that X Fold is crucial to vivo to continue to lay out the high-end market.
The problem is that, in addition to vivo, all mainstream Android manufacturers have long cut into the folding screen smart phone track, riveting enough to bet on the high-end market, the belated X Fold, can help vivo break through from the high-end, need to mark several question marks.
In the past few years, vivo has soared in the low-end market, but the high-end market can not come up with more flagship products in addition to the NEX series. From the perspective of low-end products, other domestic mobile phones are chasing and blocking unprecedented, and the differentiated advantages of vivo offline have gradually been smoothed out. In particular, Apple, which occupies most of the high-end market share, continues to explore, so that OVs feel the crisis - on March 9, the low-cost machine iPhone SE officially ushered in the third generation, priced at 3499 yuan, causing a lot of impact on the mid-end market where domestic mobile phones dominate.
Among the many competitions, in addition to apples that monopolize the high-end market, the "green factory" OPPO is undoubtedly the one that makes the "blue factory" vivo the most worried: at present, the two domestic market share is in the top two, the headquarters are located in Chang'an Town, Dongguan, Guangdong Province, Vivo founder Shen Wei and OPPO head Chen Yongming are Duan Yongping's "disciples", since the establishment of the OV has been fierce, competitive and larger, it is difficult to accept the backwardness of each other.
In the data of different research institutions, who currently ranks first in OV is different, and there is no conclusion. According to the data of the research agency Counterpoint, in 2021, vivo ranked first in the domestic smartphone market with a market share of 22%, and OPPO ranked second with a market share of 21%. In the 2021 China mobile phone market sales data released by CINNO Research, OPPO beat vivo with 20.5% market share, and vivo ranked second with 18.2% market share. However, from canalys announced global smartphone sales, OPPO led Vivo's 130 million units with 145 million sales.
Before the wolf and after the tiger. In addition to the various fancy official announcements of Xiaomi Lei Jun and Glory Zhao Ming to be the "first", OPPO head Chen Mingyong also announced to the world that he was "among the first camp of high-end flagships in the world".
For Shen Wei, a "low-key" who rarely attends public occasions and has no social accounts, he should perhaps be vigilant: although the OV in the low-end market is equal and there is no winner or loser, in the high-end market and the more potential loT market layout, other mainstream manufacturers are doing addition, and vivo is because it "sticks" to the comfort zone of the low-end market for too long, standing still or even subtracting.
01 The folding screen is not seen, how to catch up with the opponent?
In the highly competitive market, if the company does not have Apple's mature ecology and Google's core technology, then being late is often equal to lagging behind.
Folding screens are generally considered to be one of the important forms of smartphones in the future. From 2021 onwards, with the maturity of screen, hinge and other technologies, folding screens have become the protagonists of the high-end market, Huawei, Glory, Xiaomi, OPPO, OnePlus and so on flocked to enter, Samsung and China is also using folding screens to take the lead.
This is because even if the folding screen cannot become a new growth point in a short period of time, from a strategic point of view, it is the strongest muscle that all mobile phone manufacturers other than Apple can show when they conquer the high-end.
"Folding machines have entered the era of main machines, and the prerequisites including price have matured." In January this year, Honor CEO Zhao Ming twice threw the folded Magic V to the ground, saying: "The folding screen is no longer a product to test the waters, it is a flagship mobile phone that can be used as the main force." "The implication is that the folding screen will become the key to the glory of shaping the high-end brand."
Judging from the feedback from the market side, most of the folding screens are "difficult to find" and "full pre-sales". IDC data also shows that in 2021, Huawei and Samsung occupy the main share of the subdivision track, and Glory, Xiaomi, OPPO also have different performances, and even Lenovo has a certain share - among the mainstream manufacturers that have not officially released folding screen mobile phones, in addition to Apple and Google, there is only the "blue factory" vivo.
The lack of core technology, vivo has to use Qualcomm chips, Google systems, Samsung screens and other external forces to complete research and development like other domestic mobile phones, it is obvious that it is difficult to do Apple, Google like "late first", and it is difficult to "preconceived" like other domestic brands to seize the user's mind.
Judging from the currently exposed vivo X Fold folding screen mobile phone design sketch, from the design to the material, there is not much innovation and surprise. "Latecomers want to gain a foothold in the folding screen market where competition rolls in and even some aesthetic fatigue, unless there is a strong product experience, a bright innovative design, and a good user reputation." Mobile phone industry observer Lin Hui believes.
Product design and experience still need to be verified after the release of the real machine, and Vivo's "backwardness" in high-end market planning may dissuade some potential consumers. At present, vivo has no high-end product lines within the scope of the public - X, Y, U, S, Z, iQOO series, for the high-end market positioning of the products, only the iQOO 9 series released in January this year. iQOO focuses on game market users, and it is difficult to reach a wider range of people. The X series, on the other hand, has previously been dominating the mid-range market.
Looking at the major competitors, Honor has the Magic series, OPPO has the Find series and one plus with absolute controlling rights, Xiaomi has the MIX series, etc., and the high-end product lines are relatively stable. Although NEX is later to the market than the Find series and mix series, the fate is the first one to come to an abrupt end.
In Lin Hui's view, Whether the X Fold is carried by the X series or named by another product line, Vivo will inevitably add many challenges, and he even said bluntly: "Surrounded by wolves, Vivo needs to carry out strategic reshaping and trust reshaping in the high-end market." ”
All the pressure, it seems, will have to be borne by the yet-to-be-released X Fold – if it can be officially launched as scheduled, as the news has been exposed.
For vivo, which has repeatedly lost battles in the high-end market, it is not easy to catch up with its opponents in the high-end market, and even the "same door brother" OPPO. Previously, equipped with OPPO's first self-developed NPU chip - Mariana X chip folding screen mobile phone Find X5 series has been officially listed, although because of the size ratio, poor software adaptation so that netizens continue to complain, but in the high-end product route continuation, as well as to seize the user's mind, OPPO is undoubtedly one step ahead of vivo. At the same time, in the game console market, there are also one plus and iQOO head-to-head.
In the high-end market, vivo's exploration time is always much later than OPPO, but it gives up earlier. In 2011, OPPO launched the Find series and officially entered the smartphone market, although it experienced the twists and turns of stopping updating, but it continued to this day. Vivo's high-end attempts date back to 2013 - the Xplay series, which focuses on sound quality, starts at 3498 yuan, which is one of the very few domestic mobile phones at that time that cost more than 3000 yuan.
Like NEX, the Xplay series is also home. In November 2016, in order to catch up with OPPO, Xplay6 with a starting price of 4498 yuan was released, and after poor sales and word of mouth, Vivo chose to abandon the Xplay series. Now that nex has been abandoned again, is it a performance of vivo's lack of concentration?
02 IoT has the latest entry and the slowest layout
Vivo is not only late in the high-end machine market, but also "the latest to enter the game" in the IoT layout.
The most typical example is: since 2014, the smart watch industry has begun to be hot, and Apple, Huawei, Samsung, Xiaomi, OPPO and so on have successively released smart watches. But vivo did not move for a long time, until September 2020, the smart watch market has long become the Red Sea, only to release the first smart watch, coupled with not much innovative experience, as of now reduced to market cannon fodder.
The fall behind of smart watches is the epitome of vivo lagging behind too much in the IoT strategic ecological layout.
As early as 2014, Xiaomi began to envision a smart hardware ecological layout centered on mobile phones to create a Micro ecosystem of interconnection of all things. In 2019, Xiaomi proposed the "1+4+X" strategy; in 2020, Lei Jun set "mobile phone ×AIOT" as the core strategy of Xiaomi in the next decade in an internal letter.
Relevant data show that through "investment + incubation", the Xiaomi ecological chain covers all aspects of smart home, travel and other aspects, incubated dozens of listed companies and unicorns, with a market value of trillions of yuan and a total of 375 million AIoT connections.
The IoT layout is also larger than Huawei. In 2017, ecology became the core of China; in 2019, the "1+8+N" strategy was proposed for the first time at the HiLink Ecological Conference; in June 2021, the Hongmeng system was launched. In December last year, Yu Chengdong, CEO of Huawei's consumer BG, said that the number of devices connected to the Hongmeng ecosystem exceeded 320 million.
OPPO's exploration began in 2018, five years later than Xiaomi. At the end of 2019, Chen Mingyong stressed that "there will be no more pure mobile phone companies in the future", and a few months later, OPPO released its first smart watch.
In October 2020, OPPO launched two smart TVs. A little later, the "3 + N + X" IOT strategy was formally proposed, which is the same as apple, millet, and Huawei, all of which are "core + open partner" model, and self-developed chips are core technology projects that need to be broken through. Up to now, the smart products launched include smart TVs, smart watches, smart bracelets, smart headphones, AR glasses, etc., and there is even news that they are about to enter the field of new energy vehicles.
Vivo's exploration time in the loT field is actually similar to OPPO, which also began in 2018, and in September of that year, the First External Release of IoT Strategy, launched the IoT product - Jovi Internet of Things. But in terms of strategic systems, it will not be until August last year, when Hu Baishan, executive vice president of Vivo, revealed that it was "1+3+N".
As of now, it is clear that only the core "1" (mobile phone) is clear. "3" is now in addition to the tablet, the other two outside world is not yet known, I don't know whether it is difficult to land, or vivo itself is not completely determined.
The latest news on the official website of vivo shows that the smart hardware on sale currently only includes smart watches, Bluetooth headsets, and there are quite few connected devices, and even the smart glasses mentioned by Hu Baishan a few years ago have not appeared on the official website. In addition, although there have been many rumors that Vivo will release a tablet in the first half of this year, as of now there is no conclusion on when to release it.
From this point of view, the Improvement of the IoT Ecosystem, let alone the comparison with Apple, Samsung, Huawei, and Xiaomi, is compared with OPPO, vivo are too different. Slightly loud, is the Jovi InCar car business released in 2020, vivo official data shows that it has cooperated with 80+ car brands, covering 3000w+ vivo mobile phone models. However, compared with other loT ecological chains, as well as Huawei and BAT participating in the construction of the Internet of Vehicles, vivo's car-machine collaboration is not a deep cooperation.
When the larger and more complex Internet of Everything becomes a part of life and becomes the second growth curve of the mobile phone industry, vivo's backwardness in the LoT industry will undoubtedly lay hidden dangers for future development. How to launch more intelligent hardware products and improve the loT ecological layout, vivo also needs to speed up the pace.
03 The comfort zone is too long, how much courage does vivo have to explore?
Some insiders have commented that among the domestic head mobile phone manufacturers, Vivo, which is at the helm of Shen Wei, is the only remaining pure mobile phone company. Combined with NEX folding sand, folding screen delayed release, loT products too little to see, this "praise" may make vivo more embarrassing.
Relative to xiaomi's "radical", "conservative" or "cautious" words, is the label that many media have attached to vivo over the years. The outside world has always been curious: the "blue factory" vivo with under-screen fingerprints, lifting cameras, ZEISS cooperation, micro-gimbal self-research, and ISP chip self-development can be invincible in the low-end market, why is it always later than others in the future landing?
"Objectively speaking, 'conservative persistence' is an important reason for vivo's success in the mobile phone industry." Lin Hui analysis believes that from the perspective of channels, operator channels and online channels have become the mainstream, vivo has insisted on laying out offline channels for many years, and OPPO has opened stores throughout rural towns; from the perspective of products, it has adhered to the "low-end machine sea tactics to fight the world" for many years, focusing on music and photo functions; from the perspective of marketing strategies, through simple and rough advertising methods, "crazy" implants in various David TV variety shows, evening programs and film and television dramas, as well as inviting many Chinese and Korean top-stream stars to endorse and attract traffic.
The combination of these factors has allowed vivo to successfully harvest many young people, especially female users who pursue fashion, and rush to the forefront of the market in one fell swoop. "When Xiaomi, Glory, etc. turned to the front line because of the saturation of online channels and rising costs, vivo's conservatism became the biggest advantage."
The machine sea tactics covered by the full price segment are also an important weapon for vivo to keep the basic disk. From 2019 to 2020, in order to prevent Huawei from attacking, Vivo released 19 new machines; in 2021, although Huawei mobile phones fell to the bottom for well-known reasons, vivo released 49 models in one go, most of which were low-end models, ranking first among the major manufacturers of "Rongmi OV", which is also an important reason why vivo ranked first in the domestic market share in many quarters in the data of some research institutions.
Viewing the familiar low-end market as a long-term doctrine means that even if the entire environment changes drastically, vivo will only stay in the comfort zone and dare not rush to the forefront. Ni Xudong, senior vice president of Vivo, once said in an interview that Vivo is accustomed to "bowing its head and doing its own things, focusing 80% of its energy on 20% of important things."
But the problem is also obvious, offline channels + advertising marketing + machine sea tactical play is easy to be imitated and surpassed: the breakthrough progress to the high-end market is blocked, the low-end market is facing a serious squeeze from Apple, OPPO, Glory, and Millet, and offline competition is becoming more and more fierce, it is difficult to obtain higher profits, and a new growth curve. Similarly, the jihai tactic has also been used many times in Nokia, Samsung, Motorola, and Lenovo, but it has ultimately failed, proving that this tactic is a long-term strategy to ensure influence or a poison that drags down the brand, which cannot be generalized.
This can be seen from the continuous change in OV market share and position over the years. Due to the extreme similarity of culture, products, marketing, and channel strategies, those OV stores that bloom everywhere in the fourth- and fifth-tier small towns are closely adjacent to OV stores - as early as 2016, there were video network rumors that OV grassroots employees fought for customers, although OV issued a joint notice prohibiting fighting, but even at the official level, it can be clearly seen from marketing to products.
All this stems from OV and other domestic mobile phone brands, which are becoming more and more homogeneous. "OV shipments are still concentrated in low-end products, their so-called high-end flagship products, in essence, have not yet got rid of the stacking, homogeneous assembly plant OEM model, it is difficult to change the original impression in the minds of consumers, establish a high-end brand image." Andy, a middle-level person from a mobile phone manufacturer, thinks so.
Andiy believes that in recent years, although domestic mobile phones such as OV and Xiaomi have said that they have strengthened the self-research on components, the difficult situation of Huawei mobile phones has proved that not all domestic mobile phones can embark on the core technology breakthrough route. Therefore, in addition to the necessary design and research and development investment, in fact, most mainstream manufacturers have pinned their performance growth hopes on the adjustment of marketing strategies, such as running a dual-brand or multi-brand strategy: Huawei split glory, Xiaomi split Redmi as an independent brand operation, Meizu restarted the Meizu brand, are familiar cases.
OPPO is also tossing and turning under chen Mingyong's helm. In 2013, it was split off by OnePlus, and in 2018, it copied the game again to establish an independent sub-brand "Realme" for the Indian market, and then completely merged with OnePlus last year but maintained independent operations, forming a joint operation of three different positioning brands of OPPO, OnePlus and Realme.
In terms of strategic adjustment, vivo, as a BBK department, has long seen the addition of one plus to the vacancy of oppo product line, as well as the test effect of overseas markets, but it has been standing still until 2019, when the online sub-brand iQOO for game e-sports and young people was late.
From the perspective of sub-brand effect, iQOO has not yet gained a foothold in the market, far inferior to Redmi, OnePlus, not to mention the glory. In December last year, Feng Yufei, vice president of Vivo and head of iQOO, left his post, and it is difficult to see a clear strategic route in how to adjust iQOO in the future and how to get a piece of the overseas market.
In the overseas market, although vivo entered the Indian and Southeast Asian markets as early as 2014, it has only "stuck" to the above markets so far, and the market layout with more growth potential or maturity in Europe, South America, Africa and so on is not perfect. However, despite vivo's conservative strategy, it has been surpassed by competitors in the Indian and Southeast Asian markets - in the Indian market, Xiaomi has ranked first in the market for nine consecutive quarters, and the combined market share of OPPO+realme has surpassed vivo.
Mobile phone market share trend in the Indian market from 2017 to 2020
Vivo occasionally tries to differentiate one step ahead - when nex 3 was released, vivo abandoned the previous offline channels and only sold in less than 10,000 sales points and flagship stores. As a result, with the withdrawal of the NEX business unit, the mission of undertaking the reform of the vivo channel can be said to be a complete failure.
Standing in the rapidly changing moment, almost everyone sees the comfort and ceiling of sticking to the market, and also sees the difficulty and broad prospect of daring to explore. The former has the bitter lessons of the stubborn Nokia; the latter, there is the great success brought about by Apple-style innovation. Different choices, their fate will be different.
At the beginning of this year, Vivo founder Shen Wei mentioned in his New Year speech that 2021 is the first year of vivo's qualitative change, and 2022 will be the most challenging year for the smartphone industry. Compared with Lei Jun, Yu Chengdong, and even Chen Mingyong, who like toss and turn, Shen Wei, born in 1972, the keywords to describe him are usually "low-key", "duty", and "ordinary heart" - this is an important reason why the outside world believes that Shen Wei is Duan Yongping's "most orthodox" disciple, and it is also an important reason for the "conservative" market layout of vivo.
In fact, Duan Yongping, who is usually described by the media as a "low-key duty", never lacks the spirit of exploration and the courage to "dare to be the first in the world". Otherwise, it is difficult to explain why he gave up the little bully in the sky and turned to backgammon. And, from the industrialist rush to retreat, transformed into an investor, accurately invested in NetEase, GE, etc., and became "China's Buffett".
For Shen Wei, who is known as Duan Yongping's "disciple", it is difficult to avoid the outside world's questions: in the face of the increasingly fierce high-end market, vivo, who is "always slow to take a few steps", wants to stay in the comfort zone for how long?