"Wait for an oversized cup."
After this year's domestic mobile phone conference, on social networks, you can always see this clean answer.
Perhaps this is not a dissatisfaction with the current flagship products, but a feeling that manufacturers have "hidden things", leaving a backhand for the high-end market.
In general, in addition to apple and Samsung's step-by-step, there are "super cups", the flagships of domestic manufacturers in the first half of the year have a kind of "shallow taste", and they stopped when they came out of pro.
According to the previous "medium cup, large cup, super cup" three-machine strategy, these new machines are only "medium cup" and "big cup", "super cup" more exist in the rumors.
"There will be oversized cups in the second half of the year, and there will be some of them." The super cup can be regarded as the manufacturer's most prominent strength of the set of the big, look forward to it is not unreasonable.
However, this is not the case, and the party of the Super Cup and so on may not be able to win to the end.
What is the significance of the existence of the "Oversized Cup"?
The situation of cupping has existed in the mobile phone market for about four years, but in fact, it has appeared in the automobile market and the catering market, and it has been tried and tested.
As a common phenomenon in the commercial market, its purpose is nothing more than to sell goods.
▲ Starbucks cup famous terrier. Image from: Happy 59 cm Pony
It's like going to Starbucks to buy coffee, buying mostly large cups. When you shout "mid-cup," the clerk will repeatedly confirm that you really understand the Starbucks-style mid-cup, rather than the traditional mid-cup.
There is more than enough than the upper than the bottom, and this phenomenon can also be summarized by the "anchoring effect".
▲ Oversized cup: No more drying. Image from: The Age of Awakening
Of course, no matter what kind of strategy the three cups are, the demolition effect proposed by Lu Xun is more accurate. It may be difficult to sell if you pay for an oversized cup, but it is easier to accept it with two options.
Corresponding to mobile phone manufacturers, the first to adopt a three-cup strategy is actually the iPhone. Since the beginning of the iPhone XS generation, it has provided three options at once, compared to the XS Max of more than 10,000 yuan, the XR with a price of more than 6,000 pieces has become a real incense machine.
This strategy continued until the iPhone 13 generation, only this time in order to continue to subdivide, a "small cup" iPhone 13 mini was provided.
But this did not affect the sales of the original "middle cup" iPhone 13, at the same time, there is also news that the iPhone 14 generation will cancel the small cup mini and launch a 6.7-inch screen iPhone 14 Max.
▲ Rumors that the iPhone 14 Max will replace the iPhone 14 mini. Image courtesy of AppleInsider
At that time, the digital series of "Zhongbei", which was once the main one, is likely to be replaced by this big screen, thus becoming a new "Zhongbei", accompanied by an increase in the starting price.
In the domestic manufacturers, the same is true, except that what they make you pay is actually a "big cup", which is very similar to Starbucks.
▲ vivo X70 Pro+.
The "super cup" that was the absolute protagonist at the original conference was more about showing muscles and exploring the price, of course, the super cup with almost no shortcomings was also more conducive to the spread of the brand.
In the final analysis, the oversized cup strategy is to segment the market, show muscles and sell goods.
The "oversized cup" is really gone
This disappearance can actually be divided into three situations.
One is the disappearance in the traditional sense. Carefully compared with last year's product line, some manufacturers have obviously gained strength, and there is one less product in the new machine that can be compared with last year's Pro+ or Ultra, such as the Xiaomi 12 series.
▲ Xiaomi obviously has a 12 Ultra to supplement.
According to the domestic manufacturers who update and iterate every six months, the pace has slowed down significantly. Even many of the configurations of the middle cup and the big cup have begun to shrink to a certain extent, the most obvious of which is the "periscope lens" that has appeared on the big cup products in the past.
At the time of the emergence of the Super Cup, the prosperous mobile phone market began to shrink one after another, and in recent years, due to the impact of the epidemic, the shrinkage has been even greater. In the stock market, it is actually more difficult to sell mobile phones.
▲ OnePlus 10 Pro.
If you still use the "three cups" strategy, in fact, there are higher requirements for inventory turnover, invisibly the cost pressure increases, and delaying or canceling the super cup is also a way to alleviate it.
Even the profits released after the downgrade can still maintain a price close to that of the previous work, which is also a trade-off under the environment of lack of cores.
The other is the popular full-line "rising cup".
The most obvious is the X80 series just released by Vivo. Before the release of the X80 series, Han Boxiao, product manager of vivo, pointed out on Weibo that the X80 Pro was originally called Pro+, and they also canceled the original low-end, that is, the "middle cup".
▲ vivo X80 Pro.
From the final product side, the product strength of vivo X80 and vivo X80 Pro is also enough to become a "big cup" and "super cup" in the traditional sense.
Even, the upgrade sincerity of vivo X80 is higher, the anchoring effect is more obvious, after seeing the starting price of 3699 yuan, even some hearts are recommended to parents or friends.
▲ After the cup is raised, the cost performance is actually the vivo X80.
However, after the cup, the starting price remains unchanged, still the same as last year's X70 Pro+, the same is 5999 yuan (12GB + 256GB). The oversized cup is just a "name change".
Third, the "oversized cup" is reproduced in the form of a folding screen.
The role of the oversized cup is not to bear the volume, but to explore the price space of the brand and show muscle, which is "fresh" for consumers.
▲ Vivo X70 Pro+ has a built-in vivo V1 self-developed image chip.
For example, the previous Huawei P series super cup, Xiaomi 11 Ultra, vivo X70 Pro+, all of which are full of images, full focus segments, outsoles, independent ISPs, unique algorithms and so on.
It's just that with the shrinking of the mobile phone market environment and the average replacement cycle of Chinese mobile phone users has come to 28 months, the data comes from market research institute Strategy Analytics.
In other words, the current homogenization of smart phones is serious, the freshness is disappearing, and the desire to change the machine is not high.
▲ Honor Magic V.
Zhao Ming, CEO of Honor, once said in an interview, "Mobile phone manufacturers must find a suitable reason for consumers to change the machine."
And this reason is the "folding screen" with variable shape.
Also at the end of last year and the beginning of this year, domestic manufacturers have launched their own folding screen products, although the configuration specifications are different, but the price is the most expensive of all products, and the use of flagship sequences.
▲ Samsung canceled the Galaxy Note series, and the flagship began to focus on folding screen products in the second half of the year. Image courtesy of digitaltrends
At the same time, the traditional flagship strategy of manufacturers has also been reorganized, Samsung's Z Fold, Z Flip replaced note, OPPO Find series introduced Find N, vivo's X series differentiated into X Fold.
In addition to the higher price than the oversized cup, the uniqueness and recognition of the folding screen are also better than the traditional bar machine. It has also become an important part of the "curve overtaking" for manufacturers in the high-end market.
The oversized cup that was originally responsible for exploring the space and showing the muscles either disappeared or became a large cup, thus avoiding overlapping with the positioning of the folding screen.
The different forms of folding screens are the new cupping strategy
The emergence of manufacturers' super cups is actually a mature business strategy for manufacturers to exchange higher sales in the stock market.
The disappearance of the oversized cup is also a business strategy, but unlike the catering and automotive industries, the innovation of smart phones is touching the ceiling, the market is shrinking, the willingness of users to change machines has declined, and manufacturers need to constantly create more scarce features in exchange for more popularity, which can be converted into sales to obtain market share.
▲ Samsung's third-generation folding screen already supports IPX8 dustproof and waterproof. Image courtesy of Androidcentral
The folding screen, which still has a sufficient sense of freshness, is also like the previous bar machine. Manufacturers have entered the game, revitalized the industrial chain at the same time, but also began to ripen products, reduce prices, and push to the market.
At present, Samsung has divided the high-end market in the second half of the year to the folding screen, and has also adopted a dual-machine strategy, one is the horizontal Z Fold, and the other is the vertical Z Flip.
▲ Huawei P50 Pocket.
Huawei, the first to introduce the "three cups" strategy in China, has also begun to differentiate on the folding screen, the full-size folding screen of the Mate X series, the small-size folding screen of the P50 Pocket, and the folding form Mate Xs 2 released tonight.
On the surface, different forms of folding screens are actually different product sequences, but in essence, the strategy of cupping is actually form.
Compared with the straight board, different "forms" are the biggest differentiation of folding screen products, and it is more conducive to the so-called "cupping" strategy.
Therefore, the traditional "super cup" is disappearing, but the business strategy based on the "anchoring effect" will always exist, but in a different form.