Beijing, March 10 news (reporter Niu Guyue) In the early morning of March 9, Beijing time, Apple held a 2022 spring new product conference. This time, Apple mainly released a number of upgraded products, including the "Green Green" color of the iPhone 13 series, the new 5GiPhoneSE, the iPad Air with upgraded processor specifications, and the high-end desktop Mac Studio equipped with M1 chips.
On the same day that Apple released the new color of "Cangling Green", Xiaomi founder Lei Jun immediately released a Weibo, with the text saying "Wild Green", and equipped with a green mobile phone photo of Xiaomi 12Pro. The reporter learned that the Xiaomi 12 and 12Pro mobile phones were released in China at the end of 2021, when Lei Jun also proposed to "officially benchmark Apple". For the "contrast" of the two green products, netizens have left messages jokingly calling them "benchmarking iPhones in advance".
(Screenshot from Weibo)
The "benchmarking" challenge of Xiaomi and Apple also reflects the strong signal that the current high-end models of domestic mobile phone brands challenge Apple. Apple's "cost-effective" iPhoneSE series products also reflect its attempt and layout to encroach on the low-end product market of smart phones. Domestic mobile phone brands and Apple "copy each other's back roads", what kind of changes will the global mobile phone market usher in in 2022?
Apple's "downward" road: layout high, medium and low-end complete product lines
Apple, which has ridden the dust in the high-end mobile phone market, has been exploring the breakthrough of medium and low-end mobile phones.
At the spring new product launch on March 9, Apple launched a new model - the third generation of iPhone SE. The look of the third-generation iPhone SE retains the 4.7-inch display, home button, and Touch ID functionality of the previous generation. However, in terms of configuration, the third-generation iPhone SE uses the same A15 chip as the iPhone 13, and adds 5G support. The new iPhone SE starts at 3499 yuan, up 200 yuan from the previous generation of iPhone SE, and is officially released on March 18.
(Picture from Apple's official website)
Cook stressed at the press conference: "All along, the iPhone SE has been designed to accommodate a variety of advanced features and technologies, maintaining the iPhone experience at a value-added price, which is essential for users who love small size iPhones and want a great value experience." ”
This also reflects the product strategy of Apple's mobile phone in recent years to cover a wider range of user groups, with the intention of creating a complete product line of high-end, mid-range and low-end. In 2016 and 2020, Apple launched two generations of iPhone SE, both positioned in the 3,000 yuan price segment, with the intention of seizing the mid-range market of domestic Android mobile phones. According to the data, the cumulative total sales of the first-generation iPhone SE are 30 million units, and the cumulative total sales of the second-generation iPhone SE launched in April 2020 reached 24.2 million units, second only to the iPhone 11. iPhoneSE has indeed achieved Apple's purpose of encroaching on the Android mobile phone market, and the data shows that in the second quarter of 2020 after the second-generation iPhone SE was listed, iPhone SE sales accounted for nearly one-fifth of the iPhone series, of which 26% of users switched from Android devices.
Independent telecom analyst Fu Liang said in an interview with the Central Broadcasting Network reporter that the positioning of the third-generation iPhone SE is mainly to make up for the lack of low-end products in Apple's global product line, "From Apple's strategic point of view, it has formed a coverage from high to low through the iPhone13 and iPhone SE, which is still very beneficial to Apple's global sales." But in China, its pricing is more 'awkward'. Fu Liang explained that as the cheapest iPhone in Apple's sales series, the price of three generations of iPhone SE is maintained at 3000 yuan to 3500 yuan, but several major domestic mobile phone brands have also launched their own products at this price point, the overall configuration is higher than the iPhoneSE, the screen, color and camera configuration have a relatively large advantage, the product line is rich, and the user's selectivity is much greater.
"In this case, iPhoneSE is difficult to achieve a relatively large sales in the domestic market. Therefore, Apple's high, medium and low-end layout of the whole product chain is more for the European and American markets, and it is not very effective in the Chinese market. Fu Liang said.
The "scramble" breakthrough of domestic mobile phones: counterattacking Apple and impacting the high-end market
The data shows that in the fourth quarter of 2021, domestic smartphone sales fell for the third consecutive quarter, and under the boost of the iPhone 13 series of products, Apple surpassed vivo, occupied 23% of the Chinese market share, and returned to the top of the Chinese smartphone market.
The "true fragrance" of high-end mobile phones has once again attracted major domestic mobile phone brands to benchmark Apple, Samsung, etc., increase hardware, layout patents, grab the folding screen, and take high-end mobile phones as their breakthroughs in market competition.
For example, Xiaomi has intensively released a number of high-end products in 2021, covering two generations of main digital series of more than 3,000 yuan, as well as MIXFold, a folding product that explores the ceiling of the brand and is priced at nearly 10,000 yuan. At the end of 2021, Xiaomi 12 was released, proposing to "officially benchmark Apple", Xiaomi founder Lei Jun listed the advantages of this product compared to iPhone 13 on Weibo, "good feel" and "large battery", full of confidence. At the beginning of March 2022, Vivo also revealed that it will release the first folding screen flagship XFold in the near future, saying that the product has a great technological breakthrough in the core components of the hinge, and the product performance is fully benchmarked against Huawei and Samsung.
In terms of the most direct price, the pricing of high-end models of domestic mobile phones has approached the iPhone pricing range, competing for the high-end market. Xiaomi flagship models, OPPO's Find series, Honor Magic series, etc., the price rose to more than 5,000 yuan.
Fu Liang pointed out that the high-end models of domestic mobile phone brands are mostly priced in the range of 5,000 yuan to 6,000 yuan, and Apple's pricing of 6,000 yuan to tens of thousands of yuan is still a certain gap, the reason is that the premium rate and brand value of domestic mobile phone brands and apple, Samsung and other high-end mobile phone brands Still have a certain gap, "high-priced high-end mobile phones have not yet been recognized by domestic users, in addition, in the case of fierce competition for domestic mobile phone brands, high premium pricing is not easy to achieve." ”
In terms of core technology, domestic mobile phone brands are also striving for the upstream, taking chips as a must-compete highland. As early as 2014, Xiaomi developed a mobile phone SoC chip, and in 2021, Xiaomi has launched an ISP (Image Signal Processing) chip Surging C1 and a surging fuel gauge chip. Vivo officially announced the self-developed image chip V1 in September 2021, and OPPO released the first self-developed image-specific NPU (neural network processor) Mariana X in December 2021.
"So far, the chips developed by domestic mobile phone manufacturers themselves are basically targeted 'edge chips', which also solve local performance problems, such as imaging, computing and other aspects, which helps to improve the overall performance of mobile phones." But the key operating system chips are still mainstream Qualcomm and so on. Fu Liang pointed out.
At the same time, domestic mobile phone manufacturers are still continuing to increase investment in chip research and development, OPPO announced in 2020 that it will continue to invest 50 billion yuan in research and development expenses in the next 3 years, and chips are the focus. In 2022, Xiaomi also stressed that 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, "We will unswervingly implement the high-end strategy" and resolutely implement the research and development plan of "5 years and 100 billion".
Wu Yiwen, senior analyst of StrategyAnalytics, told the media that domestic manufacturers have the goal of striving for the upstream, which is very worthy of affirmation, the direction is correct, domestic manufacturers are still in the accumulation period, to accumulate technology, word of mouth, and brand power, strategic determination and determination are needed.