The consumer electronics industry in 2022 is not calm, first the graphics card avalanche in March, and then, in April, Android phones can not hold up.
On April 11, Vivo released its business flagship X Note and folding screen flagship X Fold. Among them, X Note is very interesting, this phone is simply the 7-inch business version of X 70 Pro+, but what is really interesting is the "full value preservation" service customized by Vivo for it.
According to the official statement, the full value preservation and replacement service means that "within 365 days from the 181st natural date after the mobile phone is signed, under the premise of meeting the recycling standard, the service provider can apply to the service provider to replace the mobile phone with a new machine of the same brand and series by making up the difference".
The key message of this service is that the old machine is replaced with the new machine of the same brand and series, and the replacement period is as short as one year and as long as one and a half years.
Previously, after the release of the S22 series, Samsung mobile phones also launched a similar service "100% value preservation and replacement", with the promise of basically the same as vivo.
To tell the truth, vivo, Samsung's value-keeping service and Apple's "annual renewal plan" look familiar, but users need to buy AppleCare+ services to enjoy Apple's "annual renewal plan". The apple care + service price is related to the price of the product, here to the latest iPhone 13 series as an example, the official website shows that the iPhone 13 Pro/Max AppleCare + service price is 1498 yuan, iPhone 13 is 1198 yuan.
In a word, Apple doesn't offer free lunch.
So, what about vivo and Samsung? Samsung is free on the high-end S 22 series, and vivo X Note is charged 99 yuan. Today, when inflation is high in sesame blossoms, 99 yuan is basically a free gift. As a user, it is natural to calculate an account, buy Samsung S 22 and vivo X Note, basically the manufacturer will be the flagship mobile phone white for you to use for a year, much thicker than Apple, to know that Apple's old machine is not fully depreciated (according to the price of 50% depreciation).
Of course, the manufacturer also gave the conditions for mobile phone recycling, Samsung's standard is relatively fine, vivo's is more vague, in general, as long as the normal use of mobile phones, white prostitution manufacturers a year flagship mobile phone problem is not big.
The key question is, the user took advantage of the manufacturer, does not this violate the market iron law of "buying is not as good as selling"? This requires a different perspective to find the answer.
According to data released by CINNO Research, in February 2022, smartphone sales in the Chinese market fell by 20.5% year-on-year and 24.0% month-on-month. To be honest, sales year-on-year and month-on-month data have shown a cliff-like decline, which is very rare in the history of smartphone development.
The information released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology also corroborates the above data, and the sales of 5G mobile phones in the domestic market in February 2022 are also double-digit declines year-on-year and month-on-month.
Reflected in the specific mobile phone brand, 4 of the top 5 mobile phone manufacturers in the market are down year-on-year, and the growth rate of the previous month, the top 5 manufacturers are all wiped out. The decline in the performance of all the industry's top students shows that smart phones really can't sell now.
Smart phones suddenly do not smell, on the surface is the lack of innovation points, it is difficult to persuade users to pay for money, the reason behind it is probably the epidemic repeated and other economic environmental factors, resulting in tourism, catering and other industries have been impacted, in addition, education and training turn, Internet anti-monopoly, so that a considerable number of young people face employment pressure, the result is that most people really have no money in their pockets, even if there is a little money, to cope with living expenses, pay mortgage is the primary consideration, smart phone spending can only be in the back row. The economic environment is not good, the fast moving consumer goods attributes of smart phones began to convert to durable goods, the survey shows that the replacement cycle of domestic users is now 28 months, close to two and a half years, and in the era of 4G mobile phones, the replacement cycle is generally in one and a half years.
The user replacement cycle is lengthened, but the manufacturer's new product release cycle has not changed, Qualcomm, MediaTek updates the chip once a year, Samsung, vivo, millet and other head manufacturers, the new product conference is still open twice a year. Demand is shrinking, but the supply remains unchanged, if manufacturers do not want to ship as soon as possible, 100% of the inventory of mobile phones will be smashed in the hands, bringing pressure on asset depreciation. In this regard, the greater the decline of manufacturers, the greater the inventory pressure.
Vivo mentioned above, February 2022 sales in the top five manufacturers, the year-on-year decline ranked second, the month-on-month decline ranked first. Samsung wants to make a comeback in the Chinese market and tear the iron curtain of the top five manufacturers. Therefore, these two manufacturers need to release a big move, the price reduction is the most direct, but it will hurt the brand, affect the profit, obviously more than worth the loss, so that users almost in vain for a year of "replacement plan" seems to be an optimal solution.
In the Samsung Jingdong self-operated flagship store, the Samsung S 22 Ultra National Bank has been listed for less than two months, and the effective evaluation number exceeds 10,000, which is not bad for an Android machine with a starting price higher than the iPhone 13 Pro Max. Vivo X Note was listed for two days, and the number of effective evaluations in the Jingdong self-operated flagship store exceeded 1,000, and the first sales performance was not satisfactory.
However, vivo and Samsung's "replacement plan" has led to another question: if the user is free to replace after one year, it is equivalent to the manufacturer losing money for a flagship mobile phone, the more it is sold, the more it loses, can the manufacturer hold it? The answer is that the "replacement plan" is a promotional means for manufacturers to temporarily increase sales, the target is rare, Samsung mobile phone market share in China is small, even if the S series joins the "renewal plan", the proportion of Samsung mobile phones in the entire revenue is negligible, and vivo only takes out a mobile phone to join the "renewal plan", so for manufacturers, the loss is controllable. In addition, if the sales volume breaks out, the manufacturer can completely terminate in advance, and the lost money should be smashed on the market promotion.
All in all, under the repeated epidemics, users have few money in their pockets, and smart phones, as the "duck" of the Spring River water cold duck prophet, first felt the chill of the economic downturn, and mobile phone manufacturers were forced to launch a "user white use one-year flagship mobile phone" strong needle. In a word, everyone is struggling now.
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