Author | Yu Huiru Editing | Luo Lijuan
"We want to create a top flagship that belongs to Glory consumers, which is the unswerving pursuit of Glory in the future."
"The core of Glory's high-end rise is to compete with Apple."
Since independence, Glory has frequently mentioned "high-end".
A month ago, in a group interview after the Honor Magic 4 series launch, Honor CEO Zhao Ming once again mentioned the goal of "changing Apple's monopoly in the high-end market" and said that honor Magic 4 is a product that can be compared with the iPhone.
However, he also mentioned that as a latecomer in the high-end mobile phone market, everyone's requirements for glory are very high. To lead the users of other brands, Honor must have products and experiences that attract consumers.
Since independence from Huawei, Honor has released nearly 10 products and completed four complete product systems: Magic series, digital series, V series and X series. Among them, the update frequency of high-end series machines has been adjusted from one change per year to one change per half year.
Just a few days ago, Glory officially released the news that its intelligent manufacturing industrial park carrying high-end mobile phone production was officially listed as "intelligent manufacturing demonstration factory", which is the only intelligent manufacturing demonstration factory certified by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology in the smart phone industry.
According to Honor, the factory can use a digital platform to achieve full-time tracking and management of product quality; and a large number of self-developed equipment investment, last year to achieve 75% automation, every 28.5 seconds of beat can produce a mobile phone. Honor Magic series, digital series and other high-end boutique models are manufactured here.
Honor Intelligent Manufacturing Industrial Park Employees Source: Honor Provided
In order to "show muscles", on April 25, the Honor Magic4 series production line and the Honor Manufacturing Quality Laboratory were also opened to the public for the first time.
At the same time, in terms of overall market share, Honor has returned to the highest level before leaving Huawei - from a trough of 3% in the pre-independence market share, it has returned to 17% at the end of the fourth quarter of 2021.
Under the struggle to catch up, what is the result of the glory that has been impacting the high end for a year and a half? Have you gained a foothold in the high-end market?
1
Attack from the low end to the high end
Heavy gold smashed into the high-end battlefield, glory did not hesitate.
Honor Intelligent Manufacturing Industrial Park, located in Pingshan, Shenzhen, was officially put into operation in September last year, and the first phase of investment has exceeded 1 billion yuan. At present, the industrial park has 5 buildings with a construction area of 135,000 square meters, integrating an innovative product verification center, a new process/new technology incubation center, a high-end flagship mobile phone mass production center and an intelligent manufacturing capacity building center.
At present, in the Glory Intelligent Manufacturing Industrial Park, the numerical control rate of key equipment has reached 100%, and the networking rate of key equipment has reached 95%.
In Honor's high-end strategy, the industrial park plays an extremely important role.
Here, through the deep integration of research and development, trial production, mass production and testing, we can bring more high-quality innovative products to Honor.
"When we continue to challenge new technologies, new processes, and new forms, manufacturing may become a problem. It can be designed, it cannot be manufactured. Zhao Ming, CEO of Honor, also mentioned that some breakthrough and innovative technologies also need to be completed under the premise of high confidentiality.
In the Glory Intelligent Manufacturing Industrial Park, "to some extent, it is equivalent to moving manufacturing forward, which is instructive for design." In turn, R&D systems can help manufacturing and supply chains, thereby improving manufacturing capabilities and intelligence. Zhao Ming said.
The private call function launched by Honor is implemented in the industrial park, which is the first among mobile phone manufacturers.
In addition, Honor's first folding screen mobile phone Magic V was also produced here. Due to limited stock and market heat, the premium of Honor Magic V on the third-party platform once exceeded 1,000 yuan.
In the intelligent production line of the industrial park factory, it is possible to produce straight plate machines and folding machines. "In terms of investment, the amount of production of a single folding machine equipment is several times the production of a single straight plate machine," Song Yiwen, minister of supply chain management of Glory, said frankly, "but in the future, the proportion of investment in folding machines will still increase significantly." ”
It is reported that Glory is currently preparing for the second phase of intelligent manufacturing projects, and it is expected that the annual output value will be 10 billion yuan in the future.
For Glory, on the road of high-end, although Glory strives to catch up, it is not easy to break through. After all, "high-end" is not its true color.
In November 2013, as a sub-brand of Huawei, "Glory", a mobile phone brand positioned in the Internet sales channel, it is oriented to young people, adheres to the low-end price, and harvests the market with high cost performance. From having only 20 million mobile phone users to having 200 million all-scenario smart devices, Honor took 6 years.
In 2017, With sales of 54.5 million units and sales of 78.9 billion yuan, Glory ascended to the throne of China's Internet mobile phones. Since then, Honor mobile phones have repeatedly won the crown of sales and sales in china's online market.
In 2020, honor established a new positioning after leaving Huawei: product positioning in the high-end market, the future will also launch top flagship products, to create a global iconic technology brand, to build an all-scenario, omni-channel, service to the whole population.
Last month, Honor released the Magic4 series of mobile phones in the Chinese market, priced at 3999 yuan.
Zhao Ming said in an interview after the conference that magic 4 is a product that can be compared with the iPhone, "glory to change the situation of Apple in the high-end market."
Zhao Ming believes that competing with Apple, Glory has its own advantages.
First of all, in the Chinese environment, Honor's understanding of China's Internet ecology and services is far better than Apple's. Secondly, Honor, which accounts for about 7% of R&D investment every year, will be more bold in innovation, and the use and introduction of new technologies will be faster than others.
Zhao Ming expressed relative satisfaction with Glory's high-end achievements in the past year and a half since it left Huawei.
"2500-4000 yuan price of mobile phones, our Honor 6 series is the sales champion, its share is increasing every month, objectively speaking, I think there is still a lot of growth." Zhao Ming said that after becoming independent from Huawei, Honor's brand index and consumer satisfaction have improved.
He revealed that after the release of the Magic 4 Standard Edition, more than 60% of the users who purchased the machine came from Apple and Huawei, which made Honor very excited internally.
But not only the glory, the past two years, is the domestic mobile phone brand impact of high-end concentrated exploration period. After Huawei's absence of the high-end market, many domestic manufacturers have also shouted out the slogan of benchmarking Apple and impacting high-end.
The high-end mobile phone market is also ushering in more fierce competition.
2
Stand firm in the high-end market
Since independence, Honor has been releasing new products at an incomparable pace.
Specifically, in this year and a half, Honor has released mobile phones including V40 series, Honor 50 series, Magic3 series, Honor 60 series, X20 series, X30 series, Play 5 series, the first folding screen MagicV series, Magic4 series, etc. It has formed four complete product systems of Magic series, digital series, V series and X series.
It covers the price range below 2000 yuan (X series), the 2000-2300 price range (Play 5 series), the 2500-4000 yuan price range (digital series), the 4500-8000 yuan price range (Magic series), the 10000 yuan series (folding screen series).
Even if it is a high-end model, the fate is very different. Among them, the first model after independence, the V40, was criticized and quickly disappeared from the product line. The Honor 50 series created new online and offline records on the day of first sale, and the Honor 50 series created a sales record of 3,000-4,000 yuan mobile phones three days before the listing.
Before independence, honor flagships followed a rhythm of annual updates. After independence, the speed of updates of high-end flagship machines such as Honor's digital series and Magic series has been adjusted to a semi-annual update.
Can a quick-volume strategy work?
Last year, Honor went from 16% market share before independence to 3% of the trough to 17% at the end of the fourth quarter of 2021, drawing a smile curve with shipments.
According to the latest data from CINNO Research, a third-party marketing agency, in the first quarter of 2022, the sales volume of the Chinese mainland smartphone market was 74.39 million units, a sharp decline of 14.4% over the same period last year. Glory bucked the trend, up 176% from the same period last year, up 20.9% month-on-month, and among all brands, sales ranked second, selling 12.6 million mobile phones, almost the same as the first OPPO.
According to CINNO Research statistics, Honor's three models entered the top ten of the single product sales list in the first quarter, namely Honor 60, Honor X30 and Honor Play 30 Plus, which are the most numerous domestic brands in the top ten of the sales list. Among them, the Honor 60 belongs to the high-end model, and the latter two are run-volume models.
Judging from the feedback from the sales side, the results are similar. Although honor's overall market share recovered rapidly, the running volume model is still the main reason for the pull, and the performance of the high-end model is not satisfactory.
A glory channel provider told all-weather technology that honor's high-end priced mobile phones "sell poorly." "When magic 3 was first listed, it sold ok, because its publicity was not bad, there was a star effect, and the atmosphere arrived." But Magic 4 didn't work right from the start. ”
The mobile phone channel provider added: "From our sales point of view, Honor's most popular model is still a running volume model, concentrated in the price range of 2,000 yuan to 3,000 yuan." But magic 4 didn't sell well, also because its pricing was high, and there was a feeling that it had to be fixed in one step. ”
"Honor's brand pull is still not enough, and customers still need time to change their thinking." Another mobile phone channel provider said.
In addition to the problem of its own brand pull, Glory's impact on the high-end market also faces the offensive of "fierce enemies" such as Xiaomi, OPPO, and Vivo.
Xiaomi is the second mobile phone manufacturer outside of Glory to shout out the benchmark apple. At the press conference of Xiaomi 10, Lei Jun, founder and chairman of Xiaomi, announced that the Xiaomi 10 series officially impacted the high-end market.
Despite mixed reviews from the Mi 10 series to the Mi 12 series, Xiaomi still won a stage victory in the high-end market.
According to data disclosed by Xiaomi, the first month of sales of the Xiaomi 11 series was 1.12 million units.
Xiaomi's latest financial report shows that in 2021, Xiaomi's smartphone business revenue was 208.9 billion yuan, an increase of 37.2% year-on-year, accounting for 59% of total revenue. Full-year shipments were 190 million units, up 30% year-on-year.
Among them, Xiaomi's global shipments of high-end models priced at 3,000 yuan in Chinese mainland or more than 300 euros abroad exceeded 24 million units, exceeding 10 million units in 2020.
3
Wave after wave of unevenness rises again
High-end has not been successful, and the new problem has arrived.
The replacement cycle has become longer, the epidemic has affected, and the supply chain has been trapped... Under the influence of multiple factors, the industry has reported that mobile phone manufacturers have begun to "cut orders".
Tianfeng International analyst Guo Mingqi also said on social media that major Android mobile phone brands have cut orders, accounting for 20% of this year's shipment plan, and orders may be further reduced in the coming months.
According to the analysis report on the operation of the domestic mobile phone market released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, in the first two months of this year, the shipment of mobile phones in the domestic market totaled 47.886 million units, down 22.6% year-on-year. Among them, the shipment volume of domestic brand mobile phones was 12.783 million units, down 34.7% year-on-year. 5G mobile phone shipments fell 11% year-on-year.
Executives of more than one mobile phone manufacturer have publicly admitted that the mobile phone market is weak this year.
"It's true that the entire mobile phone market is declining at the moment." Li Jie, president of OnePlus China, said in a media group interview that macro factors, epidemic factors, the speed of overall updates, the quality of mobile phones and other factors have led to the continuous extension of the entire market replacement cycle, affecting sales.
Hu Baishan, executive vice president and chief operating officer of vivo, recently expressed a similar view: First, in the Chinese market, mobile phones have entered the stock stage, mobile phones have no better innovation to attract consumers, and the replacement cycle is lengthening, extending from the earliest 16-18 months to 36 months; second, objective factors such as the epidemic affect the normal operation of offline stores, the normal distribution of online sales channel logistics, and consumer economic income, which in turn affects people's consumer demand for mobile phones.
However, Song Yiwen, director of glory supply chain management, said that because of the layout of the supply chain in advance, the glory supply chain has been very affected by the epidemic, and the current glory production and delivery are stable, and there is no situation of cutting orders. "In terms of logistics, Glory has shared among partners in Hong Kong, Shenzhen, Guangzhou, Shanghai and other partners, and even prepared a variety of solutions such as air transportation and shipping from Hong Kong to the mainland."
On the one hand, the weak mobile phone market, on the other hand, the iteration speed of new machines of major mobile phone manufacturers has accelerated. In order to catch consumers, major manufacturers do their best.
Among them, the folding screen has become a high-end opportunity for all Android mobile phone manufacturers to bet.
Qunzhi Consulting expects global foldable smartphone shipments to reach about 14.4 million units in 2022, while Counterpoint Research expects 18.3 million units.
"The folding screen is a new segment of the smartphone market in the next 2-3 years, and I think this incremental speed will be very fast." Hu Baishan said.
Zhao Ming also expressed optimism: "The shape of the straight board machine has not changed much for so many years, and the big trend and direction of the folding screen are certainly correct." In terms of experience, heavy, thick and high cost are the directions that various manufacturers need to break through. ”
Manufacturers have not given up further exploration in sub-brands and vertical areas.
Xiaomi, which also proposes to benchmark Apple, further explores women's mobile phones. Following the release of Xiaomi Civi last September, last week, the Xiaomi Civi 1S was released, positioned as a "trendy mobile phone for young people". Unlike other series, the Xiaomi Civ and Xiaomi Civ 1S devote a large space to introducing the appearance of the mobile phone, the beauty shoot, the design, the camera algorithm and other parts of the female group's concern.
The intensive mobile phone conference held in March and April also revealed the movement of some OPPO, vivo and their sub-brands, and in the new series released in the past month or so, the game mobile phone has become a drama track for them.
On April 24, OPPO released two game flagship phones, OPPO K10 and OPPO K10 Pro. In the promotional copy, OPPO focuses on words such as system response, screen sliding, fluency, and heat dissipation.
On April 21, OnePlus released the Ace series of mobile phones, which are also positioned in e-sports mobile phones. Li Jie said that the Ace series is a new game flagship mobile phone of OnePlus, and will form a oneplus performance flagship together with the digital series in the future.
Earlier, on April 13, vivo sub-brand iQOO released the new game machine iQOO Neo6. This mobile phone is also the official event machine of the Glory of Kings College League and the official designated machine of call of Duty mobile games.
At the same time, international mobile phone giants are also landing low-end strategies, such as the iPhone SE series.
Under such a situation, for Glory, on the one hand, it is the low-end market that cannot be relaxed, and on the other hand, it is struggling to climb in the high-end market, and the pressure from all directions is coming.
It is foreseeable that without huawei's blessing, Glory is still fighting alone in the high-end market and still has a long way to go.
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